Dangan Ronpa S - Kidnapped Institutional Academia
by littlesunshinelily
Summary: [So… this is the start of my story, huh? Just the story of another normal high school girl… Well, sort of. I guess I should start with my introduction. My name is Maemi Akemi, and I'm a normal high school girl in almost every way.] 16 OCs in a killing game. Rated M to be safe. Critique welcomed.
1. Prologue

So… this is the start of my story, huh?

Just the story of another normal high school girl…

Well, sort of.

I guess I should start with my introduction. My name is Maemi Akemi, and I'm a normal high school girl in almost every way. Average height, average weight, average fitness, average appearance – well, I guess I am kind of cute… everything about me is normal.

The only thing abnormal about me is one of my talents, and even then, it's not very useful. I'm… aha, I'm very good at making shadow puppets. That's pretty useless as far as talents go.

And yet, I still got scouted by Hope's Peak Academy for its first influx of students after it was rebuilt and reopened.

Despite my doubts about my talent, to go somewhere as prestigious as this just because I'm good with shadow puppets… It's like a dream.

I stood outside the gates to the rebuilt Hope's Peak Academy, eyes gazed at its massive size. Seeing the prestigious academy in front of me… I felt my chest become all light and fluttery, like my organs had just turned into butterflies and sunshine… I took a deep breath, and with a wide smile on my face, pushed open the gates and walked into Hope's Peak Academy.

I caught the slightest glimpse of someone else inside, heading towards the left. I opened my mouth to greet them, but…

I felt a sudden wave of dizziness.

Before I was aware of what was happening…

… I passed out.

 **And that was where the dream of Hope's Peak turned into a nightmare.**

I groaned as I woke up. I felt a splitting headache inside of my brain… like someone had just struck it with lightning.

"Oh, you're awake!" I heard a voice say, and I jumped back in surprise.

"Eep!" I yelled out, my hands moving in front of me.

"Hey, hey! Easy," The voice said again, and I finally focused on its source. A young boy, with bright red hair in a ponytail, and red eyes. He was dressed… strangely, to say the least. Mostly blue with touches of yellow and black. Was he even wearing a uniform?

"A-Alright, easy, easy," I said, supporting my weight on my hands. I finally took a look at my surroundings… "… Hang on, this isn't Hope's Peak Academy!"

"No, it isn't… I dunno where we are," The boy said, standing up and offering me his hand. "You need help getting up?"

"No, I'm fine," I said, but my actions contradicted my words as I took his hand anyway. He lifted me to my feet with ease and grace.

"Heh, gonna take my help anyway?" The boy grinned at me.

"Yeah… It felt rude not to." I replied. "It's also probably rude to not ask for your name…"

"Right, right. My name is Hisoka Ongakundo," Hisoka said.

"Mine's Maemi Akemi. It's nice to meet you, Hisoka!" I smiled as brightly as I could, holding my hand out for him to shake. Somehow, I think I smiled even brighter when he took it.

"Nice to meet you too, Maemi," Hisoka said. "This is probably a weird question, but… are you an Ultimate?"

"Yeah, though it's not that useful a talent… Why do you ask?"

"I'm an Ultimate too. Ultimate Modern Dancer, to be precise."

My mind finally clicked. Hisoka Ongakundo… He was both a national and international sensation when it came to modern dance performances. I'd seen some of his performances online, and I've never seen anybody move the way he does…

"Oh, I remember! Gosh, I feel so stupid to have not noticed before…" I slapped my forehead.

"Hey, we've just been thrown into some unknown shithole. As much as I love the attention, I think rememberin' I'm a dancing sensation takes a back seat in this sitch." Hisoka folded his arms. "What about you? What's your talent?"

"Ehe, I did say it was pretty useless… I'm the Ultimate Shadow Puppeteer," I said.

"Huh. Not bad," Hisoka said.

"You don't have to pretend it's more impressive than it is…" I pouted.

"Alright, fair enough," Hisoka replied. "Do you remember anything else?"

"Um… I'd just walked in the doors to Hope's Peak Academy. I saw someone else walking past, but before I could get their attention, I felt a wave of dizziness… I think I passed out, but I don't remember passing out. And then I woke up here," I explained.

"G-Geez, aside from someone walking past, the same shit happened to me," Hisoka replied.

"That… can't be a coincidence, can it?" I asked. Hisoka opened his mouth to answer, only for a screen to come to life right next to us.

"Testing, testing," The speakers boomed to life, though the screen remained dark. "Could all 16 of you bastards meet in the courtyard? And make it quick, we don't have all day."

With that, the screen shut off, and I felt nothing but confusion.

"16? Courtyard? Why?" I stammered.

"I've already explored around the place. I can take you to the courtyard, if you want," Hisoka said, giving me a grin.

"Yeah, that'd be great!" I said.

"Alright. Stay close," Hisoka said. "Can't have cute girls getting lost now!"

Geez… maybe he was a bit of a womanizer like his fanbase made him out to be. But still, I didn't have another choice. So, I followed Hisoka to the courtyard. Past a pair of winged hallways, past the bathrooms, into the library just across from the dining hall, and through the door to the left…

"Courtyard" might have been misleading. While the room was full of plant life, there was no sunlight to be seen. Just a bright, overhanging set of lights on the ceiling resembling it. Though it seemed to be moving ever so slightly around the room… I finally lowered my gaze. Staring back at me and Hisoka were 14 other people…

"Finally. I was wondering when the last two would arrive," A boy with greenish-blonde hair and goggles said.

"There's no need to be rude!" A girl in a blue beanie and with white and blue hair yelled back. "They might have just gotten a bit lost!"

"Not lost. That girl was still passed out," A boy with black hair and red eyes said. "I asked Hisoka to keep an eye on her."

"Useless boy, you should've had him just carry her here," A girl with black hair and white eyes said.

"It's useless to debate on what we should've done," A girl with blonde hair and pink eyes said. "At the moment, we need to figure out why we're here. At a café, we'd be ordering a caramel latte frappe. But what about here?"

"Don't say stuff like that, you're gonna make me hungry!" A short boy with a respirator over his face said.

"Oops, sorry!" The blonde girl replied.

"Whatever the case, we should probably get acquainted with the new arrivals," A man with black dreadlocks and glasses said. "My name's Seiryo Yuuma. From what I can see, everyone here has an Ultimate talent but me."

"Right, right! I'm Tae Kawada. I'm the Ultimate Barista," Tae, the blonde girl, said, approaching me, and taking my hand. "If you ever want a nice hot coffee or even a cold one, just hit me up! I'm always available to do so for cute girls like you!"

I felt blood rush to my cheeks at the compliment. "T-Thank you?"

"No problem!" Tae grinned at me. Her smile seemed to radiate sunshine…

"Hey, don't hog all of Maemi's attention!" Hisoka said, but he chuckled as he did so.

"I guess I should do it too…" The boy with goggles said. "Mokichi Hatsu. Ultimate Pilot."

"C'mon, where's your spirit or life?" The girl in the blue beanie said. "Introduce yourself properly, like this! Aeko Kakatto, the Ultimate Aquarium Curator!"

"We're not all as upbeat as you, Aeko. Not to mention this situation is rather unsettling," The boy with black hair and red eyes said. "Anyway. I'm Airou Himura. I'm the Ultimate Model. A pleasure to meet you."

There was an energy about Airou that was somewhat unsettling… but at the same time, there was an undeniable attraction. Maybe because he was a model?

"Are you done standing there like a brainless twit?" The girl with white eyes said. "Goodness, you're half asleep. Anyway, I am Kokuro Shiroko, the Ultimate Acrobat."

"God your voice is annoying…" A girl with lavender hair in twin-tails said. "My name is Kadiri Nakashima. I am the Ultimate Actress."

"Oh, Kadiri Nakashima? I've seen a lot of your movies! I think Painter's Dream was my favourite of yours," I said excitedly.

"Ah, yes. It is always nice to meet a fan," Kadiri chuckled.

"Should I introduce myself now?" The boy with the respirator said. "I'm Hiroshi Ohta, the Ultimate Botanist!"

I couldn't help myself when I blurted out what I said next. "Aaw, you're so cute!"

"Ehe, thank you!" Hiroshi replied.

"… What about you? You haven't introduced yourself yet," said a girl with ginger red hair. She was dressed in brown and black, and stared at me with a gaze that I thought would cut me in half.

"R-Right, right… Um, I'm Maemi Akemi. I'm the Ultimate Shadow Puppeteer." I said. As 'shadow puppeteer' exited my mouth, I felt my cheeks flush with shame.

"… Delawyn Fukui. Ultimate Assassin." Delawyn replied, folding her arms.

"Maybe we should ask those who haven't spoken yet?" Hisoka suggested, before ushering me over to a boy dressed in primarily green and a girl dressed almost entirely in brown. The boy wore glasses, and the girl wore a mask over her mouth and nose.

"Uh…" I trailed off, gazing at the two.

"Hello there. Who's your friend?" The boy with the glasses said, fiddling with his tie as he looked at me.

"Er, Hisoka Ongakundo… we introduced ourselves before, Korin. Maemi just introduced herself," Hisoka said, with a mild chuckle.

"Right you are… my apologies. So, my name is Korin Uesaka," Korin said. "This is my sister, Satoko Uesaka."

"Nice to meet you!" I smiled, holding my hand out to Satoko. She backed away from me. "Huh? Did I do something wrong?"

"No, not at all. Satoko isn't comfortable around most others right now, are you, Satoko?" Korin said, and Satoko shook her head.

"S-Sorry, Satoko… I'll give you some space," I said, backing away, before crashing into a woman with brown hair and yellow eyes. "Eek! Sorry!"

The woman laughed slightly, but her face showed no emotions. "Don't worry your head over it. Maemi Akemi, right?"

"Y-Yeah… and you?" I stammered. God, I was a mess today…

"Dai Kamowa. I'm the Ultimate Archer. Nice to meet you," Dai said, giving my hand a firm shake. I smiled as she shook it, before releasing it. As she did, I noticed two guys standing in the corner… one guy had blonde hair and wore an eyepatch over his left eye, while the other had pink hair and was in a wheelchair. I couldn't help but also notice he had no legs…

"Hey!" I called out to the two, practically dragging Hisoka over with me. The two looked up from their conversation.

"Can't wait your turn?" The blonde boy said, scratching the back of his neck.

"Ehe… sorry. I'll wait," I said.

"It's fine. He's just trying to get me to get enthusiastic again…" The boy with pink hair said with a sigh.

"There are basketball leagues played in wheelchairs, there's no reason to give up on your dreams just because you haven't got your legs!" The blonde guy said.

"My dreams ended when that car crushed my legs against a wall. I don't care what basketball leagues play in wheelchairs – how can I be considered an ultimate when I can't move anymore...?" The pink-haired boy replied.

"Swear it's just circles with this guy… My name's Kinzo Takashi. I'm the Ultimate Soccer Player. Nice to meet ya!" Kinzo said. "And I'm not gonna give up on Kenji here!"

"It'd be better for you if you did…" Kenji said. "… I'm Kenji Katayama. I was the Ultimate Basketball Player, but I don't think I've got the right to that title anymore,"

"It's better than my talent, at least…" I said.

"Yeah, see? You've still gotta be great if you're good enough for Hope's Peak!" Kinzo said.

"They scouted me before the accident… who knows. Maybe I'll just get kicked out," Kenji said.

Quickly realising this conversation would go nowhere, I bailed it, moving away from the two.

"We've been here for ten minutes with no sign of a headmaster or an explanation as to what's going on," Seiryo said, folding his arms, and pushing up his glasses.

"I'm sure the headmaster's just running a little late…" Aeko said. "There's no way he'd miss the opening ceremony!"

"Opening ceremony?" Airou frowned.

"Yeah, the opening ceremony! This is obviously just the opening ceremony!" Aeko replied.

"Never mind that the opening ceremony is taking place in a courtyard rather than the school gym, nor that we're the only class here, apparently," Airou said.

"I'm sure it's just one of many weird things about Hope's Peak," Tae said, smiling nervously. "The opening ceremony'll start soon, I'm sure of it!"

And as if cued…

"Are we all ready?" A voice called out from a rock in the garden. In unison, we all frowned and directed our gaze towards it.

I saw a white paw clutch onto the rock, and then a black one… and those paws dragged something odd onto the rock. Attached to those paws was a small plush bear, white on one side, black on the other. As I looked at it, I felt a vague sense of unease, but I didn't know why…

"What the hell is that?" Kinzo yelled, pointing towards the bear.

"It looks like a toy?" Hiroshi said, tilting his head.

"I'm not a toy," the bear replied. "I'm Monokuma!"

"Eek! It talks!" I cried out.

"Of **course,** I talk," Monokuma said, somehow frowning. "I'm Monokuma!"

"Bears don't talk! I know, I live with a polar bear at my aquarium!" Aeko pointed an accusatory finger at Monokuma.

"I'm not a polar bear!" Monokuma replied. "I'm Monokuma, and I am also your headmaster!"

"… That doesn't sound right." Delawyn said, arms folded. "The principal of Hope's Peak Academy is Makoto Naegi. That's who we were scouted by."

"Oh, Makoto's the headmaster of Hope's Peak, alright," Monokuma said. "But I thought it was pretty obvious that **you're** not in Hope's Peak!"

"We're not…?" Kenji said.

"No, you're not! Welcome to Kibou-Rehabiri Institute for Gifted Mental Patients!" Monokuma announced.

"Gifted mental patients? But we're not insane, I don't think," Korin said.

"Of course not! You're all perfectly normal high school students with Ultimate talents. This isn't a reassignment from Makoto Naegi," Monokuma said. Somehow, his eyes took on a sinister gleam. "It's a kidnapping."

"Kidnapping?" Hisoka frowned as his voice wavered, as he stood in front of me defensively. "What do you mean by that?"

"Easy. You sixteen have been kidnapped and taken to Kibou-Rehabiri Institute for such and such," Monokuma said.

"But wouldn't the nurses and psychiatrists notice I'm in the wrong place?" Kokuro said. "Of course, everyone else here is right at home."

"Don't be ridiculous, this facility has been abandoned for months! Nobody knows you're even here!" Monokuma said. "The walls are all soundproof and the doors are super-duper-double secure, and even the courtyard is blocked off! You bastards aren't leaving any time soon, unless…"

Monokuma stood there for a few moments, waiting for one of us to ask the obvious. We all stared at each other nervously in the uncomfortable silence. Monokuma laid down on the rock, tapping his claws. Finally, I broke, unable to take it anymore.

"Unless what?" I asked, little realising that what I'd just asked would damn us.

"Unless, you kill someone." Monokuma pushed himself to his feet.

For a moment, there was silence between us all. We stood, stupefied in shock at Monokuma's proposition.

"… Can you elaborate, Monokuma?" A voice behind me said, and I whipped my head around to face its source – Kadiri.

"I said what I mean! If you kill somebody and don't get caught, you get to leave. Stabbing, bludgeoning, burning, poisoning, drowning, impaling, decapitating, strangling, anything goes! Just kill somebody and don't get caught!" Monokuma said, before erupting into maniacal laughter.

I felt my blood run cold as I turned back to the rest of the class with distrust in my heart. From the sceptical looks that everyone was giving each other… I could tell that we all felt the same. I not only felt distrust and fear… I felt shame. If I'd just kept my mouth shut, maybe he would've never spoken about this…

"Anyway, if you look in your pockets, you'll see your student phones. When you log on, it'll show your name. Though I did call them phones, they have no connection to the outside world. Only the internal network of this system. You'll be able to call each other from across the academy with these, as well as review our rules and info about your fellow students. The phone will show you who's calling you, but won't keep that information," Monokuma explained. "Anyway, I think that covers everything I want to talk about!"

"Wait, one more thing," Mokichi said. "What do you mean by 'don't get caught'?"

"Geez, it explains that in the rules of your life in this place. Anyway, see you later!" Monokuma said, before disappearing behind the rock.

"Wait a minute!" Hisoka called out, before taking off at breakneck pace towards the rock…

But he was still too slow to catch Monokuma.

"Damnit! Fuck, what's happening to us?" Hisoka yelled, his fist coming down on the rock where Monokuma had been standing moments before.

"For now, we really don't have much of a choice but to check out the rules," Kadiri said, taking her phone out of her pocket.

"We've got options, though. We can explore for a way out, can't we? There's gotta be something that Monokuma missed," Kinzo said.

"It wouldn't be that easy, you dolt," Kokuro said, holding up her student phone. "Rule 3: Students are free to explore the institute as they like, but trying to leave is strictly prohibited. Transgressions will be punished."

"Okay, and the rest of the rules?" Aeko asked.

"Check them yourself, you blue bitch." Kokuro retorted.

"Blue bitch?!" Aeko shouted.

"Calm down!" I interjected, pulling out my phone and beginning to read through the rules.

 _Students are to live in Kibou-Rehabiri Institute for Gifted Mental Patients indefinitely._

 _Food, water, and other amenities will be provided to the students._

 _Students are free to explore the institute as they like, but trying to leave is strictly prohibited. Transgressions will be punished._

 _When a body is discovered for the first time, an announcement will play once 3 or more people have discovered it._

 _Following a period of investigation after the body discovery announcement, a school trial will commence. Students will attempt to find the culprit._

 _If the students correctly identify the culprit, then only the culprit will face punishment._

 _If the students incorrectly identify the culprit, then the culprit will graduate and be permitted to leave, and all other students will be punished._

 _These rules will remain in place and will continue until either a student graduates, there are two students left, or the Final Punishment takes place._

 _Any student caught breaking these rules will be punished by the Mononurses._

"Okay, two questions. One, what are the Mononurses, and two, what does 'punishment' mean?" Mokichi asked.

And again, as if on cue…

Monokuma popped up in front of us again.

Standing behind him were two people, a male and female nurse wearing a mask in the style of Monokuma's head over their faces. I could also see wires sticking out of the male nurses' hip and the female nurses' arm…

"I knew I'd forgotten something!" Monokuma announced. "Wait, what was the question again?"

"You mentioned punishment for students who break the rules, get found out as the culprit of a murder, or incorrectly identify the culprit," Mokichi said. "The Mononurses are self-explanatory, but what does 'punishment' mean in the context of this situation?" Mokichi repeated.

"Well, simply put," Monokuma said. "Execution."

"E-Execution?!" Aeko shouted, her face paling.

"You heard me right. Execution. You break the rules, get caught, or don't identify the culprit correctly, and you're executed!"

"You can't be serious!" Kinzo shouted. "You can't just execute us!"

"I'm not gonna execute you unfairly. Just follow the rules, don't kill anybody, and identify the culprits correctly, and you ain't gonna get executed. You got it?" Monokuma said. And then, without waiting for a response… he disappeared again, along with the nurses.

I felt my knees suddenly buckle from underneath me, and I fell to the floor, supporting myself on my hands.

"Maemi?" Hisoka said, crouching down next to me, and I felt his hands on my back and shoulder.

"You already trying to make your move, Hisoka?" Airou chuckled. "The rules say you can't be caught."

Something about Airou's tone snapped me out of my reverie. "H-Hey, Hisoka would never do something like that!"

"Do you have proof he wouldn't?" Delawyn said, and I could feel her gaze on me even when I wasn't facing her. "Did you know each other before the situation?"

"N-No, but I've got faith that he wouldn't do something li-" I was cut off.

"Then you have no way of knowing his true intentions," Delawyn said, before heading towards the door.

"Hey, where are you going?" Dai asked.

"Away. There were some rooms on the way in. I'm going to figure out which room is mine and take a rest," Delawyn replied, before she disappeared through the door.

"But… Gosh, how can somebody be so calm in this situation? We've been locked into a killing game…" Kadiri said, folding her arms.

"But she does have a point," Korin said. "We're free to explore the institute as we choose, provided we don't make any attempt to escape. Perhaps that is our next best course of action."

"Alright, then… I'll stay here and explore the courtyard. Does anyone want to stay with me?" Hiroshi said, raising his hand.

"I'll stay here and look with you… Maybe we'll find a koi pond with fish!" Aeko said, a wide smile on her face.

"We probably shouldn't explore in groups of any less than 3… Can't exactly go 4, since Delawyn went AWOL," Kinzo said. "So, me and Kenji'll stay with you two."

"… I'm gonna go to my room," Kenji said.

"Huh? Not you too!" Kinzo said.

"Yes, me too," Kenji said, before wheeling himself out.

"Well, I'll go explore the dining area. Maybe I can make us some coffee to help us out!" Tae said with a wide smile.

"Doesn't coffee just give you more energy?" Seiryo asked. "I mean, the caffeine in it would stimulate our current state, which isn't exactly great…"

"You're right… But doesn't it taste good? I can make coffee so great we'll forget all about this situation!" Tae said with determination, before taking off towards the kitchen.

"Hey, hold on a moment, Tae!" Seiryo said, before following her out.

"I guess I will follow them… I would not mind a strawberry frappe myself," Airou said, heading off towards the dining hall as well.

"You fools do what you want. I'm going to my room," Kokuro said, lowering her head, and leaving through the door.

"… I'm going to go investigate the library," Mokichi said, and without another word, left the room.

"I think I will decide what is most in need of my attention on the way out," Kadiri said.

One by one, the others filed out of the room, until… only me, Hisoka, Hiroshi, Aeko, and Kinzo remained.

"… So, what do you want to do, Maemi?" Hisoka asked. And once again, he held his hand out to me to help me up. Lowering my head, I took it and stood back up.

"I… really don't know," I replied. "I think I'll be happy with whatever you want to explore."

"Well, I saw a staircase to our left on the way in… maybe we could head upstairs?" Hisoka suggested.

"Sure, that sounds alright," I replied. I released my hand from Hisoka's grip, and the two of us went outside.

We both left the courtyard, venturing through the library. Mokichi was sitting at the top of one of the shelves, investigating some of the books, and Kadiri had decided the library was the place that concerned her attention the most. The bookshelves didn't quite reach the ceiling – they had about a metre of space before doing so. Piled on top were even more books, and Mokichi had created a space to sit in.

"Yo, Mokichi. What have you found so far?" Hisoka asked, stopping us momentarily.

"Books. Lots of books. Surprisingly, a place called a library has a lot of books," Mokichi replied.

"You don't need to be sarcastic about it…" I said.

"That's true, but I don't know what else to tell you. There are a lot of books. That's it, nothing else," Mokichi replied.

"Now, that's not true! There are some maps and manuscripts and documents and-" Kadiri said, before being cut off.

"All variations of a book. Are you done?" Mokichi said.

"Well, we are," Hisoka said.

"Yeah, you guys have fun with this…" I added.

"Huh… wonder if I could get a drag in here," Kadiri said as we left. Curiosity got me halfway to the door, and I turned around.

"Get a drag…?" I asked.

"Ugh. Have a smoke," Kadiri said. "In ways **your** brain can understand, I want to have a smoke."

"That can't be good for you, not as a high school student," Mokichi said.

"Nicotine keeps you up, and I need all the energy I can get…" Kadiri continued as Hisoka dragged me out of the library and into the hallway to check the stairs.

"… Huh?" I said, once I finally got a good look at them.

"Were the shutters always there?" Hisoka asked.

"I really don't know…" I said, lowering my head, and biting my lip.

"Hey, are you holding up alright?" Hisoka gently held onto my shoulder.

"Y-…" I opened my mouth to give a general response… and found myself instead beginning to bawl my eyes out. "Y… No, Hisoka! I don't know what's happening, or where we really are, or if I'll see my friends and family again, or if I'll even live! And now I can't even remember whether the shutters were always here!"

I felt both of Hisoka's hands on my shoulders… they felt nice and warm.

"Hey, eyes on me. Alright? You're gonna be alright. I know we ain't known each other for a very long time, but you're gonna be alright, Maemi," Hisoka said, giving me a reassuring smile.

And whether I wanted it or not… I felt myself fall forward, sinking my face into Hisoka's shoulder and sobbing straight into it. Everything… just felt so odd, that crying into the shoulder of a guy that I'd only known for about an hour seemed normal by comparison.

"Easy… You're gonna be alright. Even if we ain't able to escape, someone's bound to come lookin' for us. It'll be OK." I felt Hisoka's arms close around my shoulders, and… I did feel safer in his arms. I felt like I could stop crying and still be alright.

"Hah… already there's some blossoming lovebirds?" I lifted my head up at the sound of someone else's voice – Seiryo's.

"N-No, it's not like that at all! I just…" I began.

"It's fine, don't worry about it. Just make sure to use a condom," Seiryo chuckled, and I watched Hisoka's face flush almost as red as his hair.

"H-Hey, I don't need one! Because I'm not planning on doing anything to her!" Hisoka said.

"I was joking. Too much?" Seiryo smiled. "Though if it's nervousness you're still feeling, I'd get Tae to make to a decaf. Her talent speaks for itself. Well… I'm going to head to my room for the time being." With that, Seiryo walked past us.

An uncomfortable silence hung between me and Hisoka for a couple of moments… I was certain that he wasn't the only one embarrassed by those sorts of statements.

"… You should probably take Tae up on her offer," Hisoka suggested, after a few moments.

"… Yeah. Are you gonna come with me?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'll do that," Hisoka said. I reached out to grab the handle…

… and the door swung open, and I felt a hand wrap around my wrist. I didn't even have time to scream before I was pulled through the door.

"Maemi!" Hisoka called out, following me inside.

"… Too abrupt?" Tae said, tilting her head.

"Do you usually do that to your customers?" I asked, eyes wide.

"W-Well, no…" Tae pushed her fingertips together as Hisoka entered the dining room.

"Maemi, are you alright?" Hisoka said.

"Y-Yeah, I'm fine. No worries!" I gave a smile, gently wiping my eye with my sleeve.

"Have you been crying? I know just the thing that'll help your mood!" Tae said, sitting me down. "Wait here, both of you!"

… We didn't really have much of a choice. Hisoka and I sat and waited for Tae to return. In complete silence.

Tae eventually came back, two cups in her hands.

"Tada!" Tae placed the two cups on the table, one in front of me and the other in front of Hisoka. "Cinnamon-Vanilla Decaf! I used a different sweetener, too, so there's no excess energy to be found from sugar or caffeine!"

"That seems like a lot of effort to go through…!" I said, taking the cup in my hands.

"Nonsense! Nothing's too much effort for a cute girl like you!" Tae said. "Now, drink up!"

I did as Tae asked… and as soon as the coffee entered my mouth, I felt flavours I never had before. I felt myself relax almost instantly, and I sunk slightly in my chair.

"See? I told you it would help!" Tae said. "Go ahead Hisoka, you drink up too!"

"Alright, alright," Hisoka said, before taking a sip. And then another sip. And then… despite the fact the coffee was still hot, he guzzled the whole thing.

"I thought it was supposed to help him relax?" I said.

"It is, I think that's just his way of relaxing… At least, that's my guess." Tae replied, her hands on her hips. "Are you feeling alright now?"

"Yeah… much better, actually. Thank you, Tae." Hisoka said, and I felt an alarm as I realised I hadn't thanked Tae yet.

"Y-Yeah, thank you!" I quickly stammered out.

"No problem! Oh! I should probably get around to telling this to the others, but I'll tell you first," Tae said. "Okay, so there's sugar, there's sweetener, and then… on the same shelf, for some reason, there was rat poison. I moved the rat poison to a lower shelf, though, but just be careful."

"I don't think too many people here can't read rat poison labels…" I said.

"I know, I just thought it was important to know." Tae said.

"That could be dangerous information, Tae…" Hisoka pointed out. "Maybe we shouldn't tell anybody else?"

"But it doesn't feel fair to not tell anybody else… If we all know about the rat poison, it won't be a surprise if someone…" Tae began, before shaking her head. "Here, Hisoka, I'll clean out your cup!"

"A-Actually, I feel kind of sleepy… can you clean mine, too? Or at least put it in the fridge – er, if there is one?" I said.

"There is a fridge, thankfully… I'll stick it inside, no worries!" Tae said, taking my cup.

"You feel alright, Maemi?" Hisoka asked.

"Yeah, just sleepy… I think I'll go to my room, if that's alright," I said.

"Alright. I'll keep looking around. Be safe," Hisoka said, waving to me as I left.

I wandered through the hallways into the western wing of the institute… I found photographs of us on all of the doors to indicate whose room was whose. I soon found my photograph… my room was between Tae and Kokuro's room. I pushed at the door, only to find it wouldn't open.

"… Huh?" I said, tilting my head. "How do I-"

And, once again, Monokuma appeared in front of me.

"Ah, geez! What do you want now?" I asked.

"Geez, the youth today is pretty defiant to authority," Monokuma replied, before placing something hard and metal in my hand. "Can't even show a bit of gratefulness for your room key!"

"My room key?" I asked.

"Yep! You can unlock and lock your door with it! Isn't it wonderful? Oh, but don't lose it. I won't make replacements. Got it?" Monokuma said.

"Y-Yes, I've got it… Thank you?" I said.

"Finally, some manners! Everyone else just took the key and entered," Monokuma said, before disappearing once again.

I shrugged, before placing my new key into the lock, and giving it a turn, hearing a "click!" that indicated the door was unlocked. Turning the handle, I pushed open the door…

… and I saw a normal bedroom on the other side. There was a bed, a closet, a bedside table, a mirror, a desk, a notepad, and a small bathroom at the back of the room. Despite the tiredness in my body, I decided to at least check the closet and bedside table. Opening the closet revealed several sets of clothing exactly like what I was wearing. Shrugging, I opened the bedside table and its drawers. Inside, I found a… sewing kit? I didn't really have any clothes I needed to repair at that moment, so I shut the drawers.

I laid back on my bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. I felt like I shouldn't be able to get to sleep. That sleeping here was wrong. That I shouldn't do it.

And yet, falling asleep was exactly what I did…

… That concluded my first day in the Kibou-Rehabiri Institute for Gifted Mental Patients.

What should've been a wonderful first day at Hope's Peak, became a horrible first day in an abandoned mental institute.

And today... it was only the beginning of this horrible, despairing experience.


	2. Chapter 1 - Daily Life

**[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

"If you think your story is growing stagnant or boring, switch things up a little."

"Add dragons into the story."

"Even if you're writing a Workplace Health and Safety manual for your local accounting office, you can make it at least ten percent more exciting if you add dragons."

"Dragons are great."

"Switch out the protagonist for a boom mic. That also makes for an interesting story. The life of a boom mic is a story that's just begging to be written."

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

I woke up and sat up in my bed, shoving the covers off of my body, before feeling a stabbing pain enter my skull.

Gah… another headache. Must've gotten up too fast.

I groaned, and laid back down on my bed, staring blankly at my ceiling while I waited for the pain to subside.

Waiting…

Waiting…

Waiting…

…

I heard my doorbell ring, and raised my head to it. "Er, come in?"

I got no response. Right… the doors lock and unlock with the key Monokuma gave me. Groaning, I stood up, vaguely aware I was a mess, and opened the door.

I probably should've guessed Hisoka would be on the other side.

"Morning, Maemi!" He greeted me. He looked as though a night's sleep did him well, at the very least. "Er, did you get enough sleep? You're a mess."

"Morning, Hisoka… I got enough sleep, but I just woke up, and I've got a massive headache," I replied.

"Ouch… I called out to you after ringing the doorbell, so that probably didn't help," Hisoka replied.

"I said you could come in after you did that. Even if the door was locked, shouldn't you have heard me and told me it was locked?" I asked.

"I should've… maybe our rooms are soundproof?" Hisoka suggested.

"Here, I'll close the door again, and we can test it," I said.

"What about your headache, Maemi?" Hisoka asked.

"I think it's going away… I should be fine now." I closed the door slowly, leaving open a crack to say one more thing. "Okay, take a deep breath, and then start screaming." I then shut the door entirely.

I took a deep breath, and then…

… started screaming at the top of my lungs, as loudly as I could. Wordlessly. Like I was being chased by a man with an axe and wearing a mask and desperately needed help… I screamed, and screamed, and screamed.

I couldn't hear Hisoka screaming on the other side.

Was I drowning him out? I stopped for a moment, and still heard nothing. Maybe he'd stopped as well? Had… had something happened to him…?

With trembling hands, I opened the door again.

"What the absolute fuck are you doing?" I heard a voice on the other side ask. Even from here, I could see Kokuro's black pigtails and black and white dress.

"Well… we thought the rooms were soundproof, so Maemi closed the door, and I started screaming at it," Hisoka explained. "I couldn't hear her on the other side, though."

"Bizarre behaviour. Why not just use your phone?" Kokuro asked, before placing a finger to her temple. "Though I suppose that it resulted in useful information." Kokuro dusted off her dress. "Whatever the case, I'm going to get breakfast."

So Hisoka was screaming on the other side…

"So… yeah, I think the rooms are soundproof. I couldn't hear you at all," I said.

"I wasn't able to hear you either. So, definitely soundproof," Hisoka said.

"Should we tell the others?" I asked.

"Well, yeah, but Kokuro's got the right idea. Let's get some breakfast first, considering we only had a coffee for dinner last night," Hisoka said.

"Yeah, that's a good idea," I said, before heading towards the dining hall.

We arrived at the dining hall to discover most of the others were already there, with plates of cinnamon rolls, pastries, and small bowls of more traditional Japanese breakfasts piled neatly onto the table. Though Kokuro kept a table to herself with her fork stuck in her cinnamon roll, and Korin and Satoko sat together with a bowl each, everyone else had pushed tables into the centre of the room. I think they were trying to create a large communal table. I looked around, but I couldn't see Tae with them.

"Ah, you're here. Last to arrive again," Seiryo said.

"Yeah, I slept in, I guess," I replied.

"No, you didn't. You only came in a few minutes after most of us," Kadiri said, and I noticed a stick in her mouth. It looked more like a candy cigarette than an actual cigarette –for the best, I told myself. "Except for Tae. She's been up since the kitchen unlocked."

"Unlocked?" I asked, confused.

"Kadiri's only half-right when she said that you didn't sleep in," Kenji said. "The truth is, everyone but Tae slept through the Monokuma announcement."

"Monokuma announcement?" Hisoka asked.

"Well, aren't you the king and queen of repeating the last thing said to you?" Kokuro interjected.

"… Tae said there was an announcement at 7am. The kitchen and dining hall lock up at 10pm every night, and unlock again at 7am. That's what she reported to me." Delawyn scratched behind her neck.

"I see, I see… seems there's still a lot we don't know about this place," I said, giving a nervous chuckle.

"Well, obviously," Kadiri said, tossing a lilac pigtail behind her shoulder.

"Anyway… should we sit down with you guys?" Hisoka asked.

"Yeah, duh. Tae's in the kitchen making coffee, if you're wondering where she is," Kinzo said.

"We even saved you lovebirds seats across from each other," Airou said.

"Hey, it's nothing like that! We met less than 24 hours ago! We're not in some trash romance novel!" I replied.

"Kidding, kidding," Airou chuckled. Shaking my head, I sat down in one of the spare seats, and Hisoka sat down in the other. I rested my chin on my hands.

"… Have we found anything new?" Delawyn asked, leaning across onto the table.

"Maybe we should wait for Tae to get back before we talk about that," Dai said.

As if on cue, I heard her sunny voice call out from the door to the kitchen.

"I'm back!" Tae announced, and I saw… three entire trays of coffee in her hands, balanced on her head and both her hands.

"Isn't that dangerous? It could cause severe burns on your skin if you lose your balance," Seiryo said.

"Don't worry about it! I've done this so many times before, on roller skates, in places way more crowded than this, and I've never spilled a drop of coffee, let alone on myself!" Tae gave a smile as she slid the coffee trays onto the table in front of us, before taking off the one on her head and heading towards those sitting at other tables.

I watched the others grab the coffees from the tray… there were so many different kinds. But in the end, there were two cups remaining on one of the trays.

"Ehe… after you, Hisoka." I gestured towards the cups.

"Well, if you insist," Hisoka replied, grabbing the one closest to him, and I grabbed the other one.

"… Now that Tae's back, I'll repeat myself. Have we found anything new?" Delawyn asked.

I cleared my throat and spoke up first.

"Hisoka and I found out that our rooms are completely soundproof. I tested it after waking up this morning. We screamed at each other from either side of my bedroom door, and neither of us could hear the other," I explained.

"I can verify that. I still have the headache from it." Kokuro rested her head in her hand and took a sip of coffee.

"If you've got a headache, you shouldn't be drinking coffee. The caffeine would only stimulate the pain," Seiryo said, pushing up his glasses.

"Your **voice** only stimulates the pain," Kokuro retorted.

"The library has enough books to last a lifetime, so at the very least we won't have to worry about boredom. Not to mention I found a private study off of the main room," Mokichi said. "It's got an A/V section inside. It's hidden behind one of the bookcases though, so I suspect that it was either a private office for the faculty before this place was abandoned, or a former solitary confinement room."

"Either way, it's good to know it's there…" Kenji said, arms leaned across the table. "… I guess."

"Oh, I found something in the kitchen!" Tae spoke up.

"Tae, if you're gonna mention _that,_ you really shouldn't-" Hisoka began, but Tae talked over him.

"While going through the cupboards, alongside the knives and forks and other kitchen utensils, I found a box of rat poison. I already told Hisoka and Maemi about it, but I thought the rest of you should know too," Tae explained.

"Wouldn't telling us about it make us more inclined to give in to Monokuma's wishes?" Aeko asked. "I mean, it's rat poison!"

"Rat poison is hardly deadly to humans, especially in smaller doses," Seiryo said. "I don't think anyone here would be able to consume enough to kill themselves unknowingly."

"You're right… But still, it could be dangerous. Maybe I should take it and hide it in my room somewhere?" Tae suggested.

"I would hope you're not planning to give into Monokuma's wishes," Mokichi said.

"I doubt that if she had the rat poison locked up in her room, she would be stupid enough to use it on somebody," Delawyn said. "It would make her the most obvious suspect."

"Exactly!" Tae said. "And besides, I'm not the kind of girl to kill someone…"

"It's still a concern," Kadiri said. "Maybe just leave it where it is?"

"That's even more dangerous… if we left it out in the open, now we know about it, we couldn't track someone down based on who has it…" Kenji said.

This discussion was getting seriously out of hand…!

"Guys, we're not going to use the rat poison! Or stab each other, or do anything to kill each other!" I yelled, pushing myself to my feet. "Geez, it took less than 24 hours for us all to get paranoid about each other! That's exactly what Monokuma wants from us!"

"He wants us to kill each other if we want to leave. Isn't that reason enough to be paranoid?" Kokuro asked. "I don't plan on dying here."

"Well, if we all calm down, stay where we are, and adapt to our new situation, we won't have a problem with that," Airou replied.

"Yeah… now that I think about it, both Maemi and Airou have a point. We've only been here for less than a day and we're already paranoid! So, everyone! No running near the fish tank!" Aeko said.

"No running near the fish tank? What the fuck does that mean?" Kinzo asked.

"I think she means that if we let our paranoia get the better of us, we'll fall into Monokuma's trap. That's what you meant, right Aeko?" Dai asked.

"Yeah, that's exactly right!" Aeko replied. "It was a rule I gave to the kids when they came to my aquarium!"

"We can't let ourselves fall into Monokuma's trap. Let's all calm down for now, and assure each other that we won't kill each other," Hisoka said.

We all opened our mouths to make our promise to everyone, when…

"Geez, all this lovey-dovey friendship stuff is becoming un-bear-able!"

Before I had a chance to process where that voice came from, Monokuma was standing on the table in front of us. My brain caught up, and I figured that the voice came from him.

"Geez- what the fuck do you want now? Just go away already!" Kinzo shouted.

"Aw, I just wanted to join in!" Monokuma replied. "Y'know, with the whole 'We won't kill each other' emotional crap! Seeing my lovely class work together just warms my fuzzy little heart!"

"… What do you _really_ want?" Korin asked.

"… … … Fine, I'll tell you! First things first… What's in the box of rat poison will definitely kill rats, but it's not actually rat poison." Monokuma said.

"'First things first' implies you have more to say," Delawyn said, her arms folded. "What else do you have to tell us?"

"I'm getting to that, geez! Keep your skin on. I heard you guys were planning on just keeping calm and living the rest of your lives here. That might be fine for you guys, but it's just way too boring for me. And you wouldn't like me when I'm bored." Monokuma held his claw in front of his face.

"We don't like you anyway," Kokuro said.

"Geez, I come in with letters from your families, and you're telling me that you don't like me even a little bit? That hurts my fuzzy little heart, y'know."

"You don't have a heart…" Kenji lowered his head.

"Letters from our families?" Korin scowled. "Keep mine and Satoko's. I have no interest in what our parents have to say, and neither does Satoko. Right, Satoko?"

Satoko shook her head.

"It wouldn't be fair if I didn't give them to everybody!" Monokuma said, as he thrust envelopes into our hands. "Enjoy!"

"Enjoy? What's the purpose of giving us letters from our families?" Aeko asked.

"Upupupu…" Monokuma laughed. "… You know why."

"… No, we don't. Why- hey!" Hisoka stood up as Monokuma slid off the table and ran out of the room.

"It's not worth it, Hisoka. Sit down," Delawyn instructed.

"Gah… always running away, the little coward," Hisoka groaned, before sitting back down.

"So, what should we do about the letters?" Dai asked.

"I'm throwing mine away. I do not care what our parents have to say to us." Korin stood up, ripping his envelope in half.

"Where are you going to throw them away…?" Kenji asked.

"There's a bin in all of our rooms. I'm going to throw my letter away, and I suspect Satoko will do the same." Korin replied. He and Satoko stood up, and both of them left the dining hall.

"I won't deny I'm curious as to what my siblings have to say," Airou said with a chuckle. To our surprise… he slid his nail across his envelope, and we all heard the rip of the paper, as he pulled it out.

Then, Airou did something truly weird.

He read his letter out in front of all of us.

"Dear Airou… oh, we've been searching for you for ages! For the last week you've just been despair-inducingly untraceable! We're throwing this letter out there in the hopes that you'll find it, somehow, wherever you are! Please, come back to us! Signed, Etsuko," Airou said. "Aw, how sweet! They miss me."

"What are you playing at? First you say you want to adapt to our situation, and now you're getting sentimental about your siblings?" Hisoka frowned.

"I love my siblings lots, that much is true. But I can adapt to my life here without them," Airou replied. "So, what about the rest of you? I bet two hundred yen that the rest of you are all at least curious about what's in your letters."

"You're trying to push us into reading them, aren't you…" Kenji said, resting his head on the table.

"Push you? No, no. If you decide to read yours, it's your own choice." Airou leaned back, placing his feet onto the table.

"You can stop that, now." Delawyn folded her arms. "It's pretty clear that's a lie. You want to create a situation in which we're all distrustful of each other. Which is strange, for someone saying they'd rather we all adapt."

"It'll be your decision if you snap under the pressure. I won't, and I can hope the rest of you won't, but if nobody does, the game is boring," Airou replied.

As much as that annoyed me, I couldn't deny that the curiosity was getting the better of me… but I didn't want to open my letter in front of everybody.

Someone's curiosity did get the better of them, though. I heard another envelope become peeled open. I felt my chest grow tight, before investigating its source… Hiroshi had opened his letter.

"Dear Hiroshi…" He began, frowning as he read it. However, as he finished, his face drained of blood.

"What's the matter, Hiro?" Kadiri asked.

"I… I'm going to go to the courtyard. I need some fresh air and to be around some plant life for a while," Hiroshi said, pushing himself to his feet and ducking out of the door.

I stared back down at my letter again…

… and finally, couldn't take it anymore, company be damned. I ripped open the envelope, and began reading silently to myself.

 _Dear Maemi,_

 _I worry about you every day. I'm searching for you endlessly across the entire country. I can only hope to be reunited with you soon. Please be alright._

 _-Mineko Akemi_

I felt my blood run cold at the sight of the letter. Mother…

I felt my eyes begin to water.

"Maemi?" I heard Hisoka's voice, but… I couldn't look up at him. I just stared down at my mother's words…

"Don't let it get to you," I heard Dai's voice say. Despite my wish to just sit and cry, and despite ignoring Hisoka… I felt my eyes drawn to her, and I saw her envelope in her hands, open with the letter sticking out. "… It'd just be disastrous if you did."

"Dai's got a point," Hisoka said. "We've gotta do our best. I'm not asking you to not care about your mother, but don't play into Monokuma's motive."

"Monokuma's motive…?" Aeko looked up from her letter, her face similar to Hiroshi's after he read his own – drained of blood.

"Duh! He just gives out letters from our families. He's gotta be trying to get us to kill each other, by promising reunion with our loved ones if we kill and get away with it. We can't play into Monokuma's motive!"

"But is it as easy said as done?" Kadiri asked. "We all just read ours to ourselves. The only one we all know of is Airou's."

"It doesn't matter if it's that easy or not!" Tae said. "Hisoka's right, we can't just play into Monokuma's hands like that if we want to all be rescued!"

"But the chance of that murder happening is already here. Maemi and Hiroshi's reactions to their letters are proof enough of that," Mokichi said. "The question now isn't **if** someone commits murder. It's **when**."

I stood up, palms pressed into the table. "Nobody's going to kill anyone! Not me, not Hiroshi, not anybody!"

"You can speak for yourself, certainly. But you cannot speak for anyone else," Mokichi replied. "Especially not for someone who isn't here."

"Maybe I can't speak for them, but I've got faith in everyone! We're not going to kill each other!" I yelled back.

"Enough of this blindly optimistic nonsense. I'm going to go to the study." Mokichi picked up his coffee and headed towards the door. "Maybe I'll find more sense in the books than in my apparent classmates."

"Mokichi!" I shouted, but my protest was ignored. He left the room without another word. "God, he sounds just like Monokuma right now!"

"I wouldn't worry on it too much, Maemi," Dai said. "You can't fix people like him."

"He'd be way more likeable if he would just be more optimistic..." Kinzo said. "Gah, I need time out. I'm gonna go see if there's a ball or something ball-like and start kicking it around in the c'yard."

"I guess that means breakfast is over, then." Tae lowered her head, beginning to pick up the empty coffee cups.

"I guess that leaves us with whatever we're gonna do for the day," Seiryo said. I lowered my own head, nodding.

"I… I'm going to head back to my room for a while," I said, standing up and bowing. "Thank you for the coffee, Tae."

"No problem, I hope you feel better soon!" Tae smiled as though she were a beam of sunlight. I returned the smile nervously, and walked back to my room.

I threw myself onto my bed and let myself sink into the soft covers, and let every scream that had compressed itself in my throat free.

I screamed, and screamed, and screamed. In frustration, in anxiety, in misery. In worry for my mother. In worry for my new friends. In worry for Hisoka. I screamed until my throat began to hurt.

And then, for a few moments, I just laid in my bed, waiting for the burning sensation to subside from my throat. As it finally did, I sighed.

I remained laid back on my bed for a bit, before I eventually decided that I should probably go talk to someone for the day – spending it all screaming was probably the fastest way to kill my voice permanently. I pushed myself to my feet, leaving my room and heading out.

I wandered around the facility for a bit, before I finally ran into Dai.

"… An archery range of some kind would be enjoyable, but I suppose that is a large request to make," She seemed to be talking to herself.

"Hey, Dai, do you want to spend some time together?" I asked.

"Oh? Sure. Perhaps we can build a makeshift range in the courtyard together," Dai replied.

I spent some time building a basic dart board with Dai…

It seems me and Dai got a little closer today.

For a moment, we stood in complete silence. Neither of us said anything to the other. Dai… now that I'm completely alone with her, I've realised she's kind of intimidating.

"Are you feeling okay, Maemi?" Dai asked.

"Oh- ah, yeah," I replied.

"I see," Dai said. And… we went straight back to standing in silence. God, I couldn't keep letting this happen, no matter how anxious I felt!

"… So, when did you learn how to shoot a bow and arrow?" I asked.

"For as long as I can remember, I believe. Since I was a young girl," Dai replied. "My mother was a world-famous archer, and she wanted to keep that accomplishment in the family name. So, she trained me to shoot since I was very little."

"That's amazing!" I said. "Are you able to split an apple with an arrow from on top of someone's head?"

"That's… I could, I believe, but that's generally something seen in the movies," Dai said. "That, and archery doesn't always involve standing still and aiming at a still target. A lot of what I do is aiming my bow at moving targets, while moving myself. Sometimes, I'll be firing an arrow while holding the bow with my foot, clinging to life from a cliff face. Archery is more strenuous on the body than the movies may make it seem." She held her right arm out to me. "Go on, touch my bicep if you don't believe me."

"Is it really okay?" I said, though I couldn't deny I was curious…

"Of course. I wouldn't be offering if it wasn't," Dai said.

"Right, right…" I said, before placing my hands on her bicep. Wow… it was really firm and toned, the muscles plainly rigid despite her uniform.

"You must be pretty strong…" was the only comment I could make.

"Shooting an arrow over 300 metres at all isn't a task easily accomplished by those physically weak, let alone hitting a target," Dai replied as I let go of her.

"I can't imagine it would be easy…" I said. "I played with a water pistol once, and even aiming with that wa-"

Dai cut me off. " **A gun is the weapon of a coward.** "

"O-Oh, sorry!" I stammered out, hands held up defensively.

"… I apologize. I am aware this attitude towards guns is generally seen as edgy. But archery, while used in the past to kill, was also and is now, a show of skill and expertise, usually for performance. Conversely, the sole purpose of legitimate firearms seems to be killing others," Dai replied. "Not only that, but anybody can fire a gun. Even little children, unfortunately."

"Y-Yeah… sorry. It's probably a sensitive topic for you," I said.

"Do not worry your pretty little head, Maemi." Dai gently petted my head. "I will take care in the future to avoid the topic. But for now, I think it's best we part ways."

"Y-Yeah… okay," I said, turning and waving goodbye.

I turned to the monitor as I parted ways with Dai. I still had some time before night time… so I began wandering the asylum again. Blindly, and hoping to run into somebody while walking aimlessly. Eventually, my feet carried me into the library for the 3rd time, and I looked up and saw Seiryo browsing through some of the books.

"A lot of these titles seem pretty old… and for the library of an insane asylum, there are a lot of fictional books in easy grabbing reach of the patients," Seiryo mused to himself.

"Hey, Seiryo, do you want to spend some time together?" I asked.

"Huh? Oh, sure, Maemi. Maybe you can help me colour-code the bookshelves to separate fiction from non-fiction for everybody else," Seiryo replied.

I spent some time applying red and green stickers to the bookshelves with Seiryo…

It looks like me and Seiryo got a little closer today.

"Hey, so," I began, placing my hands on my hips. "Have you had any thoughts as to what your talent might be?"

"Hah, who knows? Maybe I don't even have one," Seiryo replied. "It's something I'm concerned with, but it's neither the only thing on my mind, nor anything you need to concern yourself with."

"I know that," I said. "I was just wondering if you had any thoughts. Anything that might lead you towards it?"

"I already said," Seiryo pushed up his glasses before folding his arms, "it's nothing you need to concern yourself with."

"I don't _need_ to concern myself with it, but I'm still allowed to, and I want to," I pouted. "It's not fair that one of us is left in the dark about their talent."

"Maybe. But I don't know what help a shadow puppeteer could be in rediscovering my talent," Seiryo said.

"Hey- alright, yeah, my talent isn't great! But that doesn't mean that I don't have other qualities!" I said.

"True," Seiryo said. "You should calm down, though."

"Alright, I'm calm." I took a deep breath. "So will you accept my help with finding your talent?"

"Finding my talent, or lack thereof," Seiryo said, with a chuckle on the end. "I don't need your help, but I guess I won't stop you."

"Then it's settled! Do you have any guesses so far?" I asked.

"I'm afraid not. My wardrobe's given no indications, and neither have my room fittings. My glasses aren't for show, and my dreads are neat and tidy. But that doesn't help me at all," Seiryo replied.

"Alright… new plan. I'll say some random talents off the top of my head, and you tell me if you think they fit!" I said. Before Seiryo could argue, I began listing them off. "Uh… Ventriloquist? Adventurer? Detective? Firefighter? Police officer?"

"I don't think high school students are allowed on the police force," Seiryo mused.

"Alright, then… Architect? Linguist? Archaeologist?"

"… No, none of those sound right, either," Seiryo said, with a defeated sigh. "May I suggest we retire this discussion for the time being? I don't think it's going anywhere."

I paused for a moment, before folding my arms and huffing. "Ugh… fine."

"I also think we should part ways for the time being, Maemi. But it was nice speaking with you." Seiryo waved, as he left me alone in the hallways.

I heard the monitor chime on beside me, with Monokuma showing up on it with a champagne glass full of wine in his hand.

"Attention all lunatics: it is now 10pm," He began. "It is now officially nighttime. The doors to the cafeteria and dining hall will lock shortly. Please, all of you have pleasant dreams, and we'll see each other tomorrow morning!" The monitors shut off.

I realised my body was a lot more tired than I had initially gauged, as I slouched off towards my room. I gave a nod of acknowledgement to someone – I think it was Delawyn, judging by the bright red hair – and walked into my room.

I barely wasted time – I took off my shoes and collapsed into my bed face-first, turning my head to the side as I allowed sleep to overtake me. My eyes fell closed, and I embraced the warmth of my bed. I was none the wiser of what was about to unfold…

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

"Sometimes I like to slather my whole body in honey. It's warm, it's sticky, it's sweet, and it mimics the love that my mother gave me as a cub."

"Oh, how I miss her. Maybe in retrospect, eating her was a bad idea."

"I got a new mother, though. She was even sweeter and more loving than the last."

"Probably shouldn't have eaten her, too."

"Oh well…"

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

The chimes from the monitor in my room were what woke me up the next day. With bleary eyes still trying to wake up, I looked towards it. Of course, Monokuma appeared, the same as he had the last night.

"Ahem- attention, all lunatics! It is now 7am! The cafeteria and dining hall have been unlocked," Monokuma announced. "Please, let's all have a wonderful day together!" The monitors shut off as Monokuma finished his morning announcement.

I groaned, lying back and trying to get a little more sleep. Monokuma and his antics could wait…

I'm not sure exactly how much later I woke up, but I heard my doorbell ring. I opened it, smiling, and rubbing my eyes.

"Morning, Hiso-" I began, before stopping myself. Hiroshi was standing in front of my door instead. "S-Sorry, Hiroshi…"

"Oh, it's okay, I know you expect to see Hisoka so much, so I'm not surprised by your reaction." Hiroshi bowed his head. "But we should still all gather in the dining hall, right?"

"Right!" I said, smoothing out my skirt and heading into the dining hall.

I scanned the area upon entering – Korin and Satoko sat at a table alone with a cup of coffee each, and everyone else was gathered around the central dining table. Well… 'everyone' wasn't entirely accurate.

"Where's-" I began.

"Kokuro, Seiryo, Tae, Aeko, and Hisoka?" Airou finished. "Kokuro won't come out of her room, Seiryo said he was re-reading his note, and Tae is in the kitchen making breakfast. As for Aeko and Hisoka… Kikiki, I haven't heard from him all morning."

"D-Don't laugh like that before saying you haven't seen them!" I said, and I felt my heart begin to race.

"You can't deny the possibility," Airou replied. "The motives by Monokuma, the rules of the game…"

"A pretty young man like yourself has no business toying with Maemi like that," Korin said.

"Toying with her? No, no, no. I am simply stating a very real possibility," Airou said.

"Still, don't play with Maemi's emotions like that," Hiroshi said.

"Well, if they are, they are, correct?" Airou said, before chuckling. "You never know what could've happened to them in this environment."

"I…'m gonna be right back," I said. I passed by a sleepy Aeko on the way in, offering a 'good morning' to her and a sigh of relief to myself that she was OK. But still, Hisoka…!

I turned the corner to the boy's dormitories, and…

…

…

… crashed straight into him.

"Ow!" Hisoka exclaimed, and I grabbed onto his arm to steady both myself and him.

"S-Sorry!" I replied, breathing slow, deep sighs of relief.

"Hey, no harm done, but- Maemi, are you alright?" Hisoka asked, and I felt his hand on my shoulder.

"Y-Yeah. I was stupid, and I listened to Airou when he said that you might be-" I stopped myself, and Hisoka sighed, shaking his head.

"Well, I'm fine. I just took a bit longer than usual to get ready this morning," Hisoka said, before pointing behind me to the dining hall.

"Ah, right, we should go," I said, turning back towards the dining hall, Hisoka right behind me.

"See, Hiroshi? Everything's fine! Airou's just trying to rile you up," came Tae's voice as the two walked back into the hall.

"I-It's not something to joke about, though…!" Hiroshi said, trembling slightly in his seat.

"I know, I know," Tae said. "You can't let him get to you."

"Tae's right. Besides, guys shouldn't turn on each other. We should all be dear friends," Korin said.

"Lighten up a little. I'm having a bit of fun," Airou said. "Besides. Everyone is here, and everyone's turned up OK."

"The death of one of our friends isn't fun, Airou," I said. "Nor is it funny."

"Tsk tsk tsk… what did I just say?" Airou leaned back in his seat.

"Just ignore him," Delawyn said. "Anyway, I've finished my coffee for the time being."

"Oh! Um, who else is finished? I can make another round while you guys eat breakfast!" Tae said. "And someone should probably take breakfast to Seiryo and Kokuro, too."

"I guess I'm done…" Kenji shrugged, pushing his mug forward.

"As am I." Mokichi leaned back, and Tae took the two mugs in her hands.

"I'm finished!" Aeko said, raising her hand with a smile.

"Oh. Uh, Aeko," Kadiri began, before gesturing to the top of her head. "You're missing something."

"Huh?" Aeko frowned, before her hands went to the top of her head. "Oh! Damnit! I left my beanie in my dorm room! I'll be right back." She shoved herself out of her seat.

"I gotta go pee, so I might as well leave while Aeko does to not hold shit up longer than it has to be." Kinzo pushed himself to his feet as well, heading towards the door as soon as Aeko left the room.

"Alright, guess I should go back and make more coffee," Tae said, heading into the kitchen again.

We engaged in conversation with each other for a while, Aeko coming back soon with her beanie and a smile on her face. I took a few sips of the coffee I had, and ate some of the breakfast put out for us. I managed to relax a little and just ignore the situation at hand for a while…

Eventually, both Tae and Kinzo came back at the same time.

"Sorry I took a while. Wound up having to switch halfway through." Kinzo rubbed the back of his neck.

"… Too much information," Kadiri said, looking as though she was about to gag.

"You don't have to tell us…" Kenji said, taking one of the newly made coffees from Tae.

"Yeah, sorry about that." Kinzo sat back down, leaning back and grabbing his half-finished coffee.

"Ugh. The sooner this is over, the better. I'll be taking the AV study after this," Mokichi said, grabbing one of the remaining two coffees.

"What if someone else wants to use it?" Dai asked.

"Do you?" Mokichi returned the question.

"Not myself, particularly," Dai replied.

"Anybody else want to use the AV study?" Mokichi asked. We all remained silent, and he took a sip of coffee while waiting for a response.

"I will assume that means-" Mokichi said, before breaking into a fit of coughs.

"Mokichi?" I asked, frowning. "Are you alright?"

Mokichi continued coughing.

"M-Mokichi…?!" Tae moved to his side, but he just continued coughing, his hands wrapping themselves around his throat.

Aeko and Hiroshi stood up as well, followed by myself and Hisoka… and soon, almost all of us were at our feet.

One of Mokichi's hands let go of his throat and grasped for something unknown…

…and then he slumped down in front of all of us.

A chime on the monitor from Monokuma accompanied our horror…

"Ding-dong-ding-dong! A body has been discovered! Following a brief period of investigation, we shall conduct our Class Trial!"


	3. Chapter 1 - Deadly Life

I couldn't do anything but stand there, mouth agape and eyes wide, as the Monokuma announcement rung through my ears. There had to be a mistake. This had to be some cruel prank that Mokichi was pulling. This had to be a robot duplicate. A wax replica. A hallucination. My mind swam for as many reasons as I could to justify not just seeing a dead body, but the dead body of one of our friends…

…and the dead body of someone who had died right in front of us, with us all left helpless to watch.

"N-No way… no way!" Tae's tiny frame shivered as she stared at the body.

"The… the fuck's going on?" Kinzo glanced at the monitor, then at Mokichi, then at Kenji, and kept looping and switching between the three.

And before any of us were fully prepared…

"I'm baaaaack!" Monokuma announced cheerfully, leaping up onto the table in front of us. "Did you miss me?"

"You again…?" Kenji groaned, frowning.

"Yep, yep, yep!" Monokuma nodded. "Don't look so sad to see me. I'm much happier when you guys are happy! Now, let me see your bright happy smiles!"

"How can you say something like that now? Our friend… Mokichi… He's…" Tae stammered.

"Dead," Monokuma finished. "Which means we can get to the exciting part of this little kidnapping adventure!"

"You mean the class trial, I assume." Dai said.

"Yep! When three or more people discover a body, the body discovery announcement will play!" Monokuma gleefully announced. "I will give you all some time to investigate, but when that time is up, we will all meet in the courtyard and head towards your Class Trial room! I'll explain more about how the class trial is going to work when we start that. But for now," Monokuma pulled out a phone similar to the ones we all had. "Check out your phones for the Monokuma File on the murder, and happy investigating!"

Monokuma disappeared, leaving us with only a few more answers than we had.

"… We may as well get started," Airou said, taking his phone out of his pocket.

"Hey, how are you so calm? Someone just died!" Aeko said, placing her hands against the table.

"And if we don't solve the murder, 14 more of us will, too," Airou said. "Personally, I don't want to go just yet. Besides, I already have a suspicious person in mind."

"And who's that?" Kinzo asked.

"Tae, obviously. She was the one that gave Mokichi the coffee that killed him," Airou replied.

"I- What…?" Tae's face drained of blood.

"He's got a point," Kinzo added. "She could've done something to the coffee that killed him."

"I would never-" Tae's defence was cut off by the sound of footsteps. I looked towards the doors, and saw Seiryo and Kokuro standing in the doorway.

"We heard a body discovery announcement," Seiryo said. "Is everything alright?"

"… There's a body discovery announcement and you want to know if everything is _alright_?" Kokuro shook her head.

"I'm just trying to be somewhat tactful," Seiryo said, folding his arms.

"Mokichi's dead," Hisoka replied.

"And, should we fail to solve his murder, we will all die too," Kadiri said.

"In which case, the rest of you better get a move on," Airou said, pointing to his phone, displaying what I guessed was the Monokuma File. "I can't be solving all the big mysteries here."

Ignoring Airou's snide remarks, I pulled out my own phone, and the file was plain to see on the screen as it booted up.

 _The victim was Mokichi Hatsu._

 _The time of death was 8:00 am. The body was found at the exact same time._

 _The body was found in the dining hall on the first floor._

 _The victim died almost instantly from ingesting poison. The only other wounds present were not inflicted within the past few days._

 **TRUTH BULLET – MONOKUMA FILE**

"So, poison was definitely the cause of death…" I announced.

"I have no idea why they'd mention his flying wounds, though," Dai admitted.

"Okay, that aside, poison's the murder weapon. Got that much. What should we do now?" Aeko asked.

"Investigate, I presume," Dai said.

"Investigate? But we don't know anything about how to investigate!" Hiroshi exclaimed.

"Then I guess we'll learn on the job. Let's first get someone to guard the crime scene," Airou said.

"Two people should guard the crime scene," Kadiri said. "On the off chance that we pick the culprit to guard the crime scene, of course."

"We already know the culprit's Tae," said Kinzo. "She gave Mokichi the coffee that killed him."

"I-I swear, it wasn't me!" Tae said, holding her hands up defensively.

"You've got your flimsy testimony vs the obvious implications that you could've easily done it. There's virtually no need for the trial with that card against you. Wouldn't the rest of you agree?" Airou smiled, folding his hands together.

"No." Delawyn folded her arms.

"No? The evidence points to-" Airou began. He didn't get to say much more, though – Delawyn was centimetres away from his face within moments, and I could see her emerald green eyes piercing practically into his soul. Eyes with the intent to harm him if he didn't stay quiet as she spoke to him.

"There are others that could have done it. You said so yourself – if we don't solve the murder, we die. We can't afford to throw it to chance, even if you believe it's obvious." She said, never breaking eye contact, and never showing emotion.

Airou didn't say anything, but held his hands up, backing away with a snide smile on his face. "Very well. If that is how you feel, you and I will guard the crime scene."

"Fine," Delawyn said, her expression still unchanging.

"What should the rest of us do, then…?" Kenji asked.

"I guess we should start investigating," I said.

"We?" Hisoka asked. "Maemi, I don't know the first thing about investigating."

"Neither do I, but we need to do something," I replied. "Or we're all going to die. So… let's do what we can to investigate. We'll investigate everywhere we can, so there's no way we'll miss anything. Okay?"

"Yeah, okay," Hisoka said.

"That goes for the rest of you, too. Pair off and see what we can find," I said. "And be careful."

 _ **INVESTIGATION [START!]**_

First, I decided to investigate Mokichi's body… I took a deep breath, before crouching down next to where he was slumped.

His face had gone pink, as had his limbs. There was a line of drool that was a similar colour to the coffee he had drunk dripping down the side of his mouth. Unknowing of what else to do, I pressed my finger to his wrist…

… and felt nothing. Mokichi was 100%, undoubtedly, dead. And he'd died right in front of us.

"… Cyanide poisoning." I heard Delawyn's voice beside me.

"Huh?" I said.

"Mokichi died from cyanide poisoning," Delawyn repeated.

"How do you know that?" I asked.

"I'm an assassin," Delawyn replied, as though that explained everything.

"Uh…" Hisoka tilted his head.

"… I've used cyanide before. It doesn't take much to kill somebody," Delawyn explained. "About a tablespoon will do it. That much could easily be hidden within a morning coffee."

"Where the hell would someone get cyanide in a mental asylum?" Hisoka asked.

"Not sure. Especially not with the rooms given to us," Delawyn said. She eyed me up and down for a few moments, but shook her head. "No, I can't trust you with any theories about our situation yet."

"I… see," I replied. "Um… The cyanide would be laced in the coffee as you said, right?"

"Most likely. Mokichi showed the symptoms of poisoning after he drank it," Delawyn said.

"Okay. Thank you for your help," I said. Delawyn just nodded in reply.

 **TRUTH BULLET – DELAWYN'S TESTIMONY: CYANIDE LACED COFFEE**

I nodded as well, backing away.

"Maybe now we should start looking for clues elsewhere?" Hisoka suggested.

"Yeah, I agree… Let's check the kitchen. I think we would've all seen it if the coffee was laced in the dining hall," I agreed. "After all, we're not magicians."

Hisoka and I entered the kitchen. I'm not exactly sure what I expected…

…Maybe some kind of huge mess. But it didn't really seem like it was in any disarray at a first glance…

"Hey, come look at this!" Hisoka called out, running towards something lying on the floor. I ran over as well. By the time we reached it, Hisoka was crouched on the floor, next to a box.

"What is it?" I asked, pre-emptively. As the last word left my mouth, I realised it was a box of rat poison.

"Rat poison," Hisoka replied, echoing my thoughts. "I think the box Tae mentioned."

"Okay, so there was rat poison. What's it doing behind the counter, and on the floor?" I asked.

"Dunno. But it could be important," Hisoka said.

"Right, got it," I said.

 **TRUTH BULLET – RAT POISON BEHIND COUNTER**

"Alright, so we found that. We should probably keep investigating. You check the middle counter where the coffee is, I'll check the rest of the kitchen," I instructed.

"Gotcha, Maemi." Hisoka gave me a thumbs-up, and I started walking around the rest of the kitchen, keeping my eyes peeled for anything that could be useful.

At first, I thought I would find nothing, and this entire thing would turn out to be a waste of time. But then something shiny against the dark black tiles of the kitchen caught my eyes… There were scratches in the tile, revealing shiny, silvery metal underneath the black tile coating. They smeared out from one location, the impact facing the open archway of the door.

"That's odd…" I said, lowering myself to the floor to take a closer look. I couldn't quite make out what it was supposed to be, but it kind of looked like a …footprint? I couldn't be sure, though.

"Oh, Maemi?" Hisoka asked. I turned my head, and he waved me over to the edge.

"Huh? Sorry, but what exactly am I looking for here?" I asked.

"I found some coffee dripping onto the floor here," Hisoka said, pointing out a coffee stain on the side of the counter with the rat poison nearby.

"Huh? That seems like a pretty obscure thing to look for," I replied.

"Probably, but-" Hisoka was interrupted when Tae burst into the kitchen through the dining room door, her eyes full of tears.

"Tae?" I looked up, heading towards her. "What's wrong?"

"Airou… he kept trying to insist I was the culprit, and then he said he hoped that my execution would be long and painful!" Tae replied. "Delawyn suggested I take some time away and avoid him from now on, but…" Tae said, before covering her face and sobbing.

"Hey, it's alright. We'll find Mokichi's killer," I said, gently holding onto her shoulder. "All of us. Together."

"Aaa… alright, Maemi," Tae said, wiping her face. "You're not just a cute girl… you're really helpful, too."

"I thought of something you could help us with," Hisoka said.

"Ask away…" Tae said.

"For one, did you notice the rat poison and coffee stain on the side of the counter?" Hisoka asked.

"The w- The what and who now?" Tae's eyes widened, and she leaned around Hisoka to look.

"I didn't see those at all," Tae admitted. "When did that happen?"

"Huh? Weren't you in here the entire time?" I asked. "How could you not see them?"

"Er… actually, I… wasn't in the kitchen the entire time," Tae said. "I went out to the courtyard about a few minutes after entering the kitchen with the empty mugs. I'd nearly finished, so I decided to go check. The courtyard isn't that far away, so I figured I'd be back quickly."

"Um… why'd you go to the courtyard?" I asked.

"I got a call from Seiryo. He said he wanted to meet up in the courtyard to discuss something he found. Or… at least I think it was Seiryo. I… didn't check the call ID. I kinda picked up that habit during my training as a barista – it wastes time to check caller ID, and I guess that habit stuck – sorry, I got off track! Um… He sounded weird… like he had a cold, or just something didn't sound right. I went to the courtyard and stood there for about 3 minutes waiting, before I realised I'd been pranked, and went back. I picked up the coffees and heard a scratching noise, but when I looked back, there was nothing there, so I decided to ignore it," Tae explained. "Sorry if it's not very helpful…"

"No, that could be extremely useful information," Hisoka said.

"Yeah, thank you for your help, Tae," I said.

"No problem!" Tae smiled widely.

 **TRUTH BULLET – SCRATCHES NEAR REFRIDGERATOR**

 **TRUTH BULLET – COFFEE STAIN ON COUNTER**

 **TRUTH BULLET – TAE'S TESTIMONY: COURTYARD CALL**

"Well, we should probably investigate elsewhere…" I said.

"I'll go check out the bathrooms. Maybe you can check the courtyard or gather testimonies?" Hisoka suggested.

"Okay, be careful!" I said, before heading towards the courtyard, waving to Hisoka as I left.

I walked towards the courtyard, and I saw Aeko in the library. I glanced at the door to the courtyard for a moment, before I walked up to Aeko instead.

"Hey, Aeko!" I said.

"Oh- hey, Maemi!" Aeko replied. "Sorry I haven't been investigating, but I dunno the first thing about investigating."

"That's okay, I'm not very good at this either… I don't think any of us are. A detective would be useful as hell right now," I said. "Though I do wanna know something."

"Ask away!" Aeko said.

"Alright, so, did you see anything weird while grabbing your beanie?" I asked.

"Hm… kind of? I heard Kinzo go out behind me, and yeah, he did go to the bathroom. I grabbed my beanie quickly off of the beanie stand I use-"

I cut Aeko off. "Beanie stand?"

"Oh, I use a stand for my beanie! Keeps it fluffy and neat!" Aeko replied. "So yeah, I grabbed my beanie off its stand and rushed back out. On the way out, I saw Tae heading into the library. Dunno why."

"She said she got called into the courtyard, so she was likely heading there," I said.

"Oh, really? Who called her?" Aeko asked.

"She said Seiryo called her out," I said.

"Okay… that's weird. You think that has anything to do with the case?" Aeko said.

"I… really dunno. Probably," I replied. "Okay, thanks for letting me know!"

"No problem!" Aeko replied, giving me two thumbs-up.

 **TRUTH BULLET – AEKO'S TESTIMONY: TAE ENTERS COURTYARD**

I went into the courtyard after receiving Aeko's testimony, but aside from a few footsteps, there was no trace of anybody having been in here in the last 2 hours, and I could tell from a glance those footsteps were Tae's, given their size and the fact she had the smallest feet of all of us.

Given what Aeko had already told me, I didn't think that the footsteps would prove important – they just verified that Tae had been here. I headed back to the hall to see what Hisoka had found.

 **TRUTH BULLET – SMALL FOOTSTEPS IN COUTRYARD**

I walked back to the main hall, looking for Hisoka. While heading to the boy's bathroom, however, I ran into Seiryo. I decided now was as good a time as any to ask him about the call…

"Hey, Seiryo!" I called out.

"Maemi," He greeted with a wave. "Did you need something from me?"

"Actually, yeah," I said. "Tae says you called her into the courtyard."

Seiryo's face scrunched into a confused frown. "Huh?"

I gave a similar look at Seiryo's reaction, but decided to continue. "She said you wanted to meet and discuss something. She also said you sounded like you had a cold. How much of this can you verify?"

"Absolutely none of it," Seiryo said.

"Huh?" I asked.

"It's as I told you. I never called Tae, and I have been perfectly healthy since I arrived," Seiryo said.

"Uh… okay," I said. "Thank you."

Internally, I punched myself. Two conflicting testimonies… and it looked like both had some merit. If Seiryo was sick, I think it wouldn't disappear in less than an hour.

 **TRUTH BULLET – SEIRYO'S TESTIMONY: NEVER CALLED**

With that knowledge, I went to the men's bathroom. I nearly pushed open the door before I felt a hand on my shoulder.

"Uah!" I cried out, only to find the hand belonged to Korin. Satoko stood a little ways behind him.

"Terribly sorry to startle you, Maemi," He said, "But you shouldn't go in there."

"Why not?" I asked, before my brain caught up with my mouth. "Oh! Right! Men's room!"

"If you want, I can go in for you and get him," Korin said.

"Yes please-" I began, before glancing at Satoko. "Wait, what about your sister?"

"Satoko, are you OK to stay out here with Maemi?" Korin asked. Satoko glanced at me, and then him, and then me again, and then him again. Then she nodded.

"Alright. Don't worry, little sister, I'll be in and out." Korin waved, before disappearing into the men's room.

And leaving both of us outside, awkwardly standing there, neither of us able to say anything.

"…"

"…"

"Uh… so, you don't talk much, do you?" I said.

Satoko shook her head.

"Is there a reason?" I asked.

Satoko raised her head, exposing her throat, and tapping it twice. She then shook a finger and giving a thumbs-down.

"Oh- sorry, are you mute?" I asked.

Once again, Satoko shook her head.

"She doesn't like how her voice sounds," came Korin's voice from behind me, and I just barely avoided yelling out. But Satoko nodded, affirming what Korin said.

"You aight, Maemi?" I heard the increasingly familiar voice of Hisoka ask.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Did you find anything relating to the case?" I asked.

"Nah. I checked the urinals, the toilets, and the sinks, and I found nothing." Hisoka replied.

"Oh, I see…" I said, before the monitor above us four turned on.

"Ding-dong-ding-dong! The investigation period is up! All lunatics, please meet up in the courtyard! Anybody who is not there in the next five minutes will be punished by the Mononurses!" Monokuma said, before the monitors flicked back off.

"We barely gathered anything, though…!" I protested, despite the fact that the monitor was now off, and Monokuma couldn't hear me.

"We don't really have a choice, it seems," Korin said. "Let's do our best with what we have."

I soon found myself in the courtyard. The other 14 students were there, save for Mokichi… It was still so hard to believe he was gone forever.

"We're all here, then," Dai commented.

"Well, obviously. Monokuma threatened to punish anyone who didn't come," Kadiri replied.

"S-Still, is Mokichi's killer really among us?" Hiroshi said. "It's possible Monokuma killed him…"

"No, I don't think he'd do that. Mokichi's killer is in this very room," Airou said.

"Whether they are or aren't, we gotta solve this murder for Mokichi's sake! He wouldn't've wanted to die in vain like this!" Aeko said.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, I don't wanna die. We gotta get through this!" Kinzo said.

"Don't worry, we'll solve this murder, and everything will be alright!" Tae said.

"I'm no investigator. None of us are. But I'm sure we will reach a conclusion during this trial," Korin said.

Satoko nodded in approval of her brother's words, but remained silent as ever.

Kokuro huffed. "Let's just solve this."

"Yeah… I don't really care if I live or die, but it'd be good if the rest of you lived," Kenji said.

"It'd be good if you lived, too," Seiryo said.

"… I agree," Delawyn said, simply.

"We're all here, then, but where's Monokuma?" Hisoka asked.

And obviously waiting for his chance to make an appearance, Monokuma descended from the ceiling.

"Here I am! Thank you all for waiting!" Monokuma announced. "I'm sure you're all beary excited for the trial!"

If Kokuro was in any way excited at all, her groan at Monokuma's pun dried up whatever enthusiasm she had.

"Geez, tough crowd… Anyway, please gather in the gazebo over there! Don't worry, Kenji, it's a ramp-up."

"How fucking considerate…" Kenji lamented.

We ventured into the gazebo. I stayed close to Hisoka… I really don't know why. I just felt safer around him, like he was someone I could trust in this madness. Eventually, we were all inside the gazebo.

Monokuma jumped in with us. "Here's a little secret, just for the fifteen of you! This isn't really a gazebo…"

The gazebo's vines – or at least, I'd thought they were vines – suddenly came down around the open areas of the Gazebo, fully enclosing us inside. "It's an elevator to the Trial Room. Have fun!"

Monokuma disappeared as the gazebo-turned-elevator began its descent.

We stood in silence for a few moments. There was nothing but the silent whirr of the elevator and the disappearing light of the courtyard above us to bide our time.

"… Geez, how far down does this thing go?" Aeko yelled after a few moments, finally breaking that silence.

"Be patient, Aeko. I'm sure we'll reach it soon," Dai said.

"I like the long descent, actually. Gives some time to think," Airou said.

Hisoka turned to me after a moment.

"How are you feeling about the trial?" He asked.

"Is that some kind of joke?" I retorted, before covering my mouth. "S-Sorry, it's just… not so hot. We don't have anyone who knows about investigating murder scenes. We barely found anything during our investigation, and now we're being asked to solve a crime…"

"I know. It's not gonna be easy. But we're gonna do it together. All of us. We'll find the culprit," Hisoka assured me. "You gave me the strength to help with investigating. I wanna give you strength as well, Maemi. The strength to face this trial with your head held high and eyes forward. We got this. Okay?"

"Okay!" I replied. And whether I wanted to or not, I found myself holding onto his hand. I needed that strength and courage right now.

The elevator continued its descent, before finally coming to a halt, the doors opening to reveal a strangely built courtroom on the other side. I felt my heart skip a beat, despite Hisoka's warm hand enclosed around my own.

In the trial that awaited us…

… one of us killed Mokichi Hatsu.

And we had to condemn them to save the rest of us.

It was cruel…

… but we had no choice.

It was the class trial to live. It was the class trial to die.

It was our first class trial.


	4. Chapter 1 - Class Trial Part 1

We all gathered around the circle of podiums in the centre of the courtroom, haphazardly at first. We weren't entirely sure what to do; were we supposed to just stand at a podium in the circle? Wait for Monokuma's instructions?

Eventually, though, Korin and Satoko stepped forth and took their place – and that seemed to convince the rest of us to start to do the same. I stood at one, before noticing a metal nameplate in front of me. I crouched down to read it, as it was at my hip. The nameplate read "Kadiri Nakashima".

"Excuse me, that's where I stand," Kadiri said from behind me.

"Oh, sorry," I said, and began circling the room trying to find where I was supposed to stand. It seemed that most of us failed to stand where we were supposed to at first – and we had no way of knowing, nor any real wish to know personally, what would happen if we stood at a podium that wasn't our own.

Eventually, I came across the nameplate that contained my name. I looked to my sides – Satoko stood to my left, and Airou to my right. Directly across was Hisoka.

One of the people standing at this circle killed Mokichi Hatsu… and they did it right in front of all of us.

And right now, they're the only one who knows.

But one thing I do know is, I will shed light on the truth.

 **[CLASS TRIAL – START! ALL RISE!]**

"Now then," Monokuma began. "Let's begin with a simple explanation of the class trial! During the trial, you will discuss the murder, present your arguments, and vote for whodunnit! If you vote correctly, then only the culprit will receive punishment. But if you pick the wrong person…"

Monokuma paused for dramatic effect, I assume, before finally speaking again. "… I'll punish everyone besides the culprit, and they will earn the right to leave the asylum!"

"Could it really be? Is… is Mokichi's killer really among us?" Tae asked, her lower jaw trembling.

"Yep, yep! There's no doubt that the culprit is among you," Monokuma said.

"It's unlikely Monokuma would interfere and kill somebody unless necessary," Dai said. "If he wished to do that, he would've done so when he kidnapped us."

"So, he died in the dining hall, right? Everybody there should be suspected, then," Kokuro said.

"Huh? But we can keep tabs on each other there, and I never saw anything suspicious," Hiroshi said. "N-Not until… Mokichi… died."

"He has a point. If anything, those who left the dining hall, and those who never went to the dining hall, are the most suspicious," Korin said.

"Hey, there's no way I left long enough to do something like this!" Aeko said.

"I stayed in my room until the body discovery announcement. This has nothing to do with me," Kokuro said.

"Bwah… you can't just wave suspicion away like that," Kenji said.

"… Let's start with discussing the murder weapon, and make sure we're all up to speed," Delawyn said.

 **[ NON-STOP DEBATE 1 – START! ]**

"The murder weapon…" Kokuro begun. "That was listed in the Monokuma File, right?"

"Of course." Airou raised his finger.

"Mokichi died due to a lethal poison," Dai said.

"It's probably the **wounds on his back** … someone must've poisoned him overtime through them." Kenji said.

[ **TRUTH BULLET – MONOKUMA FILE** ]

"That's wrong!" I shouted.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"No, that's not right," I said. "The Monokuma file says that Mokichi died by _ingesting_ poison."

"Oh… then what were the wounds on his back listed for?" Kenji asked.

"Likely, a red herring," Hisoka suggested. "We can probably assume they were piloting wounds – y'know, debris hitting him while he was flying, and stuff like that."

"… Let's just focus on the poison for now," Dai said.

"The killer must've administered the poison by having Mokichi ingest it, right?" Hiroshi said.

"That's what the file said. Don't know how. I don't know anything about investigating, so I skipped all of that," Kokuro said.

"That's quite careless," Korin said.

"I really don't care if you think it's careless or not," Kokuro retorted. "Bottom line is, I don't know how the killer made him take poison."

"H-Hey, all of our lives are on the line here!" Kinzo said.

"Then I trust that you'd have done some investigating yourself, you sweaty dog," Kokuro said.

Kadiri caught her laughter in her throat, disguising it as a cough.

"Sweaty dog? You're really gonna fuckin' call me that?" Kinzo said.

"Yes. I am," Kokuro said.

"Can you please focus on the task at hand? How did Mokichi take poison?" Seiryo asked. "Injection, ingestion, application to the ears, how?"

I… think I already know how Mokichi took poison.

 **[SELECT A TRUTH BULLET!]**

 _ **[**_ _ **TRUTH BULLET – DELAWYN'S TESTIMONY: CYANIDE LACED COFFEE]**_

"Here!" I said.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"The killer made Mokichi ingest cyanide by putting it in his coffee without him noticing," I explained. "I don't think he'd willingly and knowingly ingest it."

"Cyanide poisoning?" Aeko said. "T-That bad?!"

" 'That bad'?" Kinzo repeated.

"I was devastated when this happened, but back at my aquarium about two years ago, some rowdy 9th grader poisoned one of my fish tanks with cyanide," Aeko said. "It's a horrible way to go… His family was fined, but I still worry about his parents due to that fine."

"… Getting back on topic, where would the cyanide even come from? There's nothing here that'd hold cyanide," Korin said.

"That's not true," Hisoka said. "Maemi, I think we found something that could be housing cyanide. No… it's gotta be that thing. It's the only way it makes sense."

I nodded, and I had a feeling I knew what Hisoka was talking about…

 **[ HANGMAN'S GAMBIT 1 – START! ]**

 **R** **A** **T** **P** **O** **I** **S** **O** **N**

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"The rat poison must've been cyanide!" I exclaimed. "We found no other poisons in our search."

"Couldn't Delawyn have poisons in her bedroom, being the Ultimate Assassin?" Kokuro asked. "I'm asking because there was a hula hoop suspended from the ceiling in my room, and I'm the Ultimate Acrobat."

"There are things relating to my talent too, but none of them are poisons, since I work almost entirely with weaponry," Delawyn replied. "I never left the dining hall, either, most of you were there and saw me. I couldn't have done it."

"So the rat poison being cyanide all along is the only conclusion that makes sense," I said.

"This off-topic discussion was cute and all," Airou began, "but I think it's time that we stopped throwing the obvious back and forth- Mokichi was poisoned this, the poison was that, it's boring. Let's at least move onto the obvious that is more useful to us."

"What does that mean?" Kadiri asked.

"I mean that Tae is the culprit," Airou said, with a smug smile on his face.

"This again?! I swear to God, I'm not the culprit!" Tae said. "Please, just leave me alone, and don't describe any punishment!"

Airou ignored her pleas – aside from the one about describing her punishment.

"Everybody, think about it. Tae is the most obvious suspect here. She was in the kitchen long enough, with the means to poison Mokichi, and nobody, in normal circumstances, would suspect her of poisoning the coffee," Airou explained.

"I-I know how it looks, but I swear, it's not how it looks!" Tae's hands cupped the sides of her neck. "Please, you've got to believe me, it wasn't me!"

"Can't deny that Airou's got a point," Kinzo said, folding his arms.

"She definitely had the opportunity to poison him…" Dai cupped her chin between her thumb and forefinger.

"She had the opportunity, sure. But I doubt she's the one who did it," Delawyn said. "Or at the very least, the only one who could have done it."

"Yeah! Does Tae really look like the kind of person to kill someone?" Aeko pumped her fists.

"Looks can be rather deceiving." Korin pushed up his glasses. "Especially in this situation."

Satoko nodded, agreeing with her brother.

"I'm convinced she did it, too," Seiryo said.

"Bwah… did she really? Still coulda been someone else…" Kenji asked.

"She was in the kitchen, alone, with the drink that killed him. I'm convinced," Kokuro said.

"You're certainly not alone in that, my monochrome friend," Kadiri said.

"We're not friends." Kokuro folded her arms.

"I don't agree with this, not entirely …" Hiroshi pushed his fingers together. "I really don't think Tae would do such a thing!"

"Maemi… what do you think?" Hisoka asked.

"I... honestly don't think Tae is the only one who could've done it, either…" I admitted.

"You're crazy if you think that," said Airou.

"No, she isn't crazy. I agree- there's gotta be other suspects we ain't considering." Hisoka leaned forward, supporting his weight on the podium in front of him.

"And if we don't consider at least the possibility of another culprit, we vote for Tae, and she turns out innocent, we'll all die here," Delawyn added.

"Upupupu… Looks like you guys are split down the middle!" Monokuma announced. "You know what that means?"

"… We've hit a hung jury?" Seiryo suggested.

His suggestion was answered with Monokuma slipping a key into the panel in front of him.

Hisoka's lean on the podium soon turned to a grip, and the rest of us were soon holding onto the sides as well, with me stifling a shriek, as the podiums were all raised into the air. I couldn't do anything but wait for the podiums to finish raising themselves. Who knows? Maybe Monokuma would just lift us up and drop us all onto the floor for hitting this hung jury.

Eventually, however, the podiums stopped… and were arranged differently to the circular shape they were in the courtroom. We were arranged in two lines on opposite sides of the room, and opposite me was Airou.

 **[DEBATE SCRUM – START!]**

 **[TAE IS THE KILLER]**

 **[TAE MAY NOT BE THE KILLER]**

 **[ START! ]**

"Tae's the most **suspicious** out of all of us," Airou said.

"Ehh… what exactly makes her so **suspicious**?" Kenji said.

"Tae was out of the **dining hall** for most of the morning," Dai said.

"Kinzo and me left the **dining hall** as well, and Seiryo and Kokuro never showed up!" Aeko said.

"She was also the one to discover there was fuckin' **poison** in the kitchen," Kinzo said.

"I told everyone about the **poison** , so everybody else knew about it too!" Tae said.

"There's also the fact she handed the **coffee** to him," Kadiri said.

"So, if one of the rest of us handed the **coffee** over, would we be suspicious instead?" Hisoka said.

"Fact of the matter is, she had the biggest **chance** of all to kill him," Seiryo said.

"That doesn't mean she's the only one who had a **chance** ," Delawyn said.

"She was the only one who was frequently in the **kitchen** ," Korin said.

"Others could've entered the **kitchen** too!" Hiroshi said.

"There's too much evidence against her to consider her **innocent** ," Kokuro said.

"We can't say she's not **innocent** until we explore all possible outcomes!" I said.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"I know that right now, Tae is one of the most suspicious people. But if we just write her off as the culprit now, and we're wrong, we'll all die," I said, panting heavily, as our podiums returned to their rightful places in the circle on the ground.

"Maemi's… actually got a good point. Sorry, I wasn't thinking straight," Seiryo said.

"Thank you. Now, let's discuss all possible-" I started.

"-Let's actually think for 2 seconds and put two and two together," Airou cut me off. "The semantics of Tae not being the culprit are cute, but let's think realistically for a moment."

"For god's sake, just shut up for a moment and let Maemi speak!" Hisoka yelled out.

"I will, but she better let me speak first," Airou said.

"… Alright, then. Speak," I said.

"With pleasure, Maemi." Airou grinned smugly.

 **[ NON STOP DEBATE 2 – START! ]**

"Tae had all the opportunities to kill Mokichi," Airou began.

"Hey, that doesn't mean that I did it!" Tae said.

"If you were in the kitchen," Korin began, "that means you should have **seen someone else** enter if it's not you."

"But **I didn't see anyone else enter** or exit!" Tae dug her fingertips into her scalp.

"You werein the kitchen **the whole time,** " Airou said. "If you saw nobody else enter, you must be the culprit."

 **[TRUTH BULLET – AEKO'S TESTIMONY]**

"That's wrong!" I shouted.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"No, Tae wasn't actually in the kitchen the whole time!" I said. "Isn't that right, Aeko?"

"Huh? Oh! Yeah!" Aeko said, pumping her fists. "When I left to get my beanie, I went into my room and grabbed it as quick as I could. I grabbed it so fast I knocked over several things in my room! And as I was coming back, I saw Tae leaving the kitchen, and heading into the library."

"I-Yeah, I did go to the library!" Tae said.

"See? If she wasn't there the whole time, she couldn't be the only one who could've entered the kitchen. I don't think she could be the only one who did it!" I said.

" _Inexcuseable," Dai said._

"You're telling me that because she left for a few seconds to likely get a cookbook for breakfast, she can't be the culprit?" Dai continued.

"Huh? That's not what I'm saying, I'm saying she's not the only one who could be!" I replied.

"That's ridiculous. The short amount of time Tae spent in the library surely can't just immediately absolve her of guilt," Dai said.

I know that Tae probably didn't do it… I've just got to convince everyone. I can't back down from this!

 **[ CROSSED SWORDS 1 ]**

 **[ START! ]**

"You're being ridiculous right now, Maemi," Dai began.

"You really think there's another suspicious individual?"

"Tae's the obvious culprit!"

"Dai, she's not the only one who could've entered the kitchen." I said.

"Anyone else who wasn't in the dining hall the whole time could've entered the kitchen without us noticing too!"

"She spent the most amount of time in the kitchen," Dai continued.

"And was the only one we know was in there!"

"The **30 seconds she spent out of the kitchen** shouldn't make a difference!"

 **[TRUTH BLADE – TAE'S TESTIMONY]**

"I'll cut through that contradiction!" I shouted.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"Tae left for way longer than 30 seconds, actually," I said. "According to her testimony, she left for about three **minutes**."

"And I didn't exactly stay in the library… I went to the courtyard, actually," Tae added.

"Three minutes?" Kenji repeated. "It'd be possible for someone who either never went to the dining hall, or left the dining hall and came back, to get in and out of the kitchen within that time…"

"There's no other proof that Tae went to the courtyard aside from her words, is there?" Airou asked. "Not to mention, Aeko could be working as an accomplice."

"Why the heck would I do that? I'm not the kind of girl to kill someone either!" Aeko said.

"An accomplice is an interesting concept, though…" Kenji said.

"Monokuma, what's the deal with accomplices? Do they get to graduate for their part in the murder if they succeed?" Korin asked.

"While you can certainly work together, only the one who actually killed the victim will be allowed to graduate!" Monokuma replied.

"So, even if two people work together, one person has nothing to gain from it," Delawyn said. "They'd be executed alongside the rest of us."

"But we only just learned that now. Who's to say they didn't work together?" Kokuro asked.

"Geez, listening to you talk about this is so annoying! There's no accomplice in this crime!" Monokuma said, before his paws clasped over his mouth. "Oops! I said too much! May the fires of a stake burn me to a crisp for my loose lips!"

Monokuma's wording prompted a snicker from Hisoka.

Accomplices aside, there was more proof Tae went to the courtyard…

 **[SELECT A TRUTH BULLET!]**

 _ **[TRUTH BULLET – SMALL FOOTSTEPS IN COURTYARD]**_

"Here!" I said.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"Actually, there is. I found footsteps in the courtyard, too," I began. "and they were too small to belong to anybody else but Tae."

"The fuck was Tae even doing in the courtyard, anyway? If she'd been in the kitchen the whole murder could've probably been avoided." Kinzo scratched the back of his neck.

"I don't think it was a coincidence or a random occurrence," Korin said. "Now that this has all been cleared up for us, I suspect the killer must've had the intention of luring her out to the courtyard in the first place."

"Can you tell us everything that happened, Tae?" Hiroshi asked.

"Yes, I will now. I'm sorry," Tae said.

"If anyone else should say sorry, it's Airou. He kept pushing for your guilt long after it was obvious we should consider other options," Hisoka said. "You don't gotta apologize, Tae."

"… Pardon me?" Airou said.

"Um… anyway, I got called out to the courtyard from a phone call. They said they wished to discuss something with me. I went out to the courtyard, and I waited for about three minutes, but nobody came," Tae explained. "I realised I'd been ding-dong-ditched, so I went back to the kitchen, grabbed the coffees, and went into the dining hall…"

"And then you handed out the coffees, correct?" Kadiri asked.

"Yes, that's correct. And then, Mokichi, he… God, I had no idea it would end up like this," Tae said.

"Yes, you did. Because you poisoned the coffee," Airou said.

"You're just being excessive with your accusations now, Airou," Korin said. "We've already largely cleared her of suspicion."

"We have? I thought we agreed there could be other suspects. Perhaps there are, but that doesn't mean Tae is innocent," Airou said.

"Why…? Why do you just keep bombarding me with these accusations?" Tae yelled. "Stop it, stop it, stop it! I didn't poison the coffee!"

"I'm not going to stop. Watching you plead your innocence so desperately… it's quite enjoyable," Airou said.

"What kind of motherhecking sadistic monster _are_ you?" Aeko stamped her foot against the ground.

"Kikiki… a realistic one," Airou said.

"C'mon, there's got to be something that _proves_ Tae wasn't the only one in the kitchen!" Hiroshi said.

There is something that proves Tae's not the only person to go into the kitchen…

 **[SELECT A TRUTH BULLET!]**

 _ **[TRUTH BULLET – COFFEE STAIN ON COUNTER]**_

"Here!" I shouted.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"The coffee stain on the countertop…" I said.

"A little coffee stain is what proves her innocence? Maemi, you've started losing your mind," Airou said.

"Says the guy getting off to backing a tiny girl into a corner," Seiryo commented.

"I'm not losing my mind at all! That little coffee stain is what proves Tae's innocence!" I said.

"Even I'm not sure where you're going with this. Explain." Kadiri waved her hand.

"Yesterday, Tae had balanced several trays of coffee with whipped cream peaking high over the top of the mugs, in both of her hands and on her head," I explained.

" _I'm back!" Tae announced, and I saw… three entire trays of coffee in her hands, balanced on her head and both her hands._

" _Isn't that dangerous? It could cause severe burns on your skin if you lose your balance," Seiryo said._

" _Don't worry about it! I've done this so many times before, on roller skates, in places way more crowded than this, and I've never spilled a drop of coffee, let alone on myself!" Tae gave a smile as she slid the coffee trays onto the table in front of us, before taking off the one on her head and heading towards those sitting at other tables._

"Do you really think someone with that good balance and hand-eye coordination would knock coffee out of its mug while it's perfectly still on the countertop?" I asked.

"Maybe she was in a rush…" Kokuro suggested.

"I wasn't in a rush!" Tae argued. "I take pride in my work as a barista and even during heavy rush periods, I never spill a drop!" Tae said.

"The coffee stain would indicate heavily the coffee was what poisoned Mokichi, so it makes no sense for her to leave coffee stains on the countertop. Am I wrong?" I asked everybody.

For once, Airou remained silent.

I glanced around the courtroom, my pulse racing, my face breaking out into a cold sweat as I eyed everyone. I didn't have much evidence that proved Tae's innocence left…

… finally, somebody spoke up.

"… I think, if we have no objections, we can safely say Tae isn't the one who killed Mokichi," Delawyn said. Thankfully, it wasn't to object to what I said…

"The question now is, if not Tae, who is the culprit?" Korin asked.

"If half of you didn't decide to jump on Airou's bandwagon, we would've probably discussed that by now…" Kenji said.

Kenji… he had a point. Though we'd cleared Tae of her guilt, we didn't have a clear lead to the culprit…

Were… were there any clear leads to the culprit at all…?

Were we just at a dead end, both figuratively and literally…?!

 **[CLASS TRIAL – SUSPENDED]**


	5. Chapter 1 - Class Trial Part 2

**[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

"A lot of people like to ask me, 'Monokuma, how do you keep your stuffing so white and fresh?'"

"And the answer to that is very simple!"

"Whenever a beautiful, pure, innocent young cub departs this sinful earth too early, I like to give them some of my stuffing and take some of theirs to put in me, as a little parting ritual!"

"Oh, but as for keeping my stuffing white and fresh, I just take a nap in the washing machine."

"Works for washing my lovely soft fur, too!"

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

 **[ CLASS TRIAL – RESUME! ]**

I stared around the courtroom, desperate for another voice to speak up and suggest something – my own voice wasn't working. I felt my breath catch in my throat, and start coming out in short, quick, sharp bursts. I gripped onto the podium in front of me, desperately trying to keep my head straight, and vision sharp…

… But it wasn't any use. My lungs felt both burning hot and ice cold as I took shallow breaths. My knees felt like they were going to buckle from underneath me if I let go of the podium, and my vision began blurring over as my hands began trembling.

"Maemi?" I made out a single voice through the blur, and desperately tried to focus on it – the red-blue blob that I could only just make out as Hisoka.

I still said nothing. I couldn't say anything. I felt a hand gently place itself on my left shoulder – just barely touching it. I stifled a scream, desperately trying to focus on him.

"Maemi… if you need to breathe for a moment, it's alright. I… think I know enough about the case to help, at least a little," Hisoka said. "You've already done so much for us. So… just focus on breathing slowly and calming down, okay?"

"… O… okay," I managed to just choke out.

"We'll get through this. I promise," Hisoka said.

 **[POV CHANGE – HISOKA ONGAKUNDO]**

I watched Maemi sink to the floor, keeping her grip on the podium and taking deep breaths. I wanted to hold her close and be there for her physically, like I was with the shutters. I wanted to do that so badly, but… I was on the other side of the courtroom.

And… I think she'd prefer it if I helped her solve this case.

"For now, we should compile a list of suspects," Delawyn said, dragging us back to the task at hand.

"Everyone in the dining hall, right?" Kokuro said. "That will not be much help to us."

I… don't think that she's right.

 **[ Who are the most likely suspects? ]**

Mokichi and Monokuma

Everyone in the dining hall

 **Everyone who wasn't in the dining hall**

Korin and Satoko

"I've got it!"

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"No, everyone that was in the dining hall for the entire time's got an alibi for the murder. We're all innocent. It was everyone who either left the dining hall, or were never there to begin with," I said. "We've proven Tae and Aeko are innocent, as Aeko's alibi backs up Tae's, and Aeko wasn't gone long enough to have both grabbed her beanie AND to go to the kitchen."

"I was in my room the whole time. I knew nothing of any murder until the Body Discovery announcement," Kokuro said.

"I just went to take a piss," Kinzo said. "Came back just as Tae was entering with her coffees."

"I also remained in my room the entire time. My mother's handwriting… it seemed different, somehow," Seiryo said.

"Wait… you're the one that called me out to the courtyard," Tae said.

"I'm sorry?" Seiryo asked.

"You called me out to the courtyard!" Tae said. "I got a call, I asked who it was, then you said it was you, Seiryo, and that you wanted to meet up in the courtyard."

"I did none of those things," Seiryo said.

"… Hisoka?" I heard a voice say, and my eyes immediately went to its source. Maemi.

"I… think I've calmed down enough to keep going," She continued.

"Okay. Don't feel afraid to take a break if you need it again, okay?" I replied.

"It's okay… I'm really grateful that you're here, Hisoka," Maemi said, before pulling herself back to her feet.

 **[ POV CHANGE – MAEMI AKEMI ]**

I took one last deep breath, before returning to the mind space of the trial.

"Alright, what were we discussing?" I asked.

I heard two voices, Tae and Seiryo, speak up at once.

"He's saying I never called him to the courtyard!"

"She's saying I called her to the courtyard!"

"H-Hey, calm down! One at a time!" I stammered out.

"I apologise, Maemi. You speak first, Tae," Seiryo said.

"Hu- uh, oh! Thank you. Seiryo's saying he never called me out to the courtyard, but I definitely got a call from him!" Tae said. "… Uh, are you feeling alright, Maemi? Do you need anything?"

"Y-Yeah, I'm fine… Let's just focus on the trial for now," I said. "Seiryo?"

"Tae says she received a phone call from me instructing her to the courtyard. I know I am unable to prove it, but I never made a call," Seiryo said.

I… think I knew what they were talking about now. And there had to be a correct answer to who was telling the truth…

 **[ SHADOW BLADING – START! ]**

…

…

…

 **[QUESTION ONE: Who was called out to the courtyard?]**

 **Tae Kawada**

Seiryo Yuuma

…

…

…

 **[QUESTION TWO: Where was Seiryo all morning?]**

The Courtyard

 **His room**

…

…

…

 **[QUESTION THREE: Who is telling the truth about the call?]**

Tae Kawada

Seiryo Yuuma

 **Both of them**

…

…

"It's all coming together!"

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"It's possible you're _both_ telling the truth, right?" I said.

"Both? Telling the truth? Their testimonies contradict each other entirely," Kadiri said.

"It might seem like they do at first, but there's a major hole in them that we hadn't considered. Tae, you said it sounded like Seiryo had a cold or something similar, right?" I asked.

"Y-Yeah, it did…" Tae answered.

"He looks totally fine to me," I said.

"Colds don't magically disappear within 5 minutes, either," Seiryo added. "There'd still be traces if I had one. Stuffy nose, lowered voice, raw throat… any number of symptoms."

"And you never checked the caller ID, right? In fact, I think you said you had to ask who it was just before," I said. "I believe you said, 'I asked who it was,'."

"Y-Yeah- Wait, does that mean-!" Tae stammered.

"Someone impersonated Seiryo?" Korin asked. "Interesting."

"Interesting, yet stupid. What would they have done if Tae did check the caller ID?" Airou said.

"Deny it, of course, but I do not believe it would help their cause," Kadiri said.

… I think there's only one person who could've done it.

Someone who could impersonate Seiryo well enough to fool Tae for a few moments to lure her out, and someone who had a window of opportunity to enter the kitchen after she'd gone …

They're the only one that makes sense.

 **[ SELECT SOMEONE! ]**

Hisoka Ongakundo

Kokuro Shiroko

Seiryo Yuuma

Dai Kamowa

Hiroshi Ohta

Aeko Kakatto

Airou Himura

Maemi Akemi

Satoko Uesaka

Korin Uesaka

Kadiri Nakashima

Mokichi Hatsu

Delawyn Fukui

Tae Kawada

Kenji Katayama

 **[Kinzo Takashi]**

"You're the only one!" I said.

 **[ … ]**

"Kinzo… was it you?" I asked.

"… The fuck do you mean?" Kinzo asked.

"I don't think it's possible for Maemi to have been any clearer with what she meant…" Kenji said.

"I got no fuckin' idea what she's on about," Kinzo said.

"We established that everyone who stayed in the dining hall couldn't have done the murder, as we could all keep tabs on each other since the start of the morning. We've proven beyond any doubt that Tae, Aeko, and Seiryo didn't do the murder," I said. "And are you really going to tell me that Kokuro's high-pitched voice can imitate Seiryo?"

"Colds naturally pitch your voice _down,_ by the way," Seiryo said.

"That's just speculating. You've got no damn proof against me," Kinzo hissed, clenching his fists.

"He's terrible at hiding it, isn't he?" Airou chuckled.

"Shut up! You don't have any room to talk, you're the one who kept backing Tae into a corner earlier!" Kinzo said. "I don't have anything to hide!"

"Kinzo, please, calm down. If you're innocent, I'm sure you can prove it," Delawyn said.

"Sure can! I can show you my call hist-!" Kinzo began.

"Our phones have no call history," Kadiri cut him off.

"R-Right. Shit, my bad." Kinzo rubbed the back of his neck. "Then I assure the rest of ya, I'll find some way to prove I ain't the killer!"

 **[ NON-STOP DEBATE 3 – START! ]**

"There's nothin' saying it's _definitely_ me, right?" Kinzo said.

"Not beyond a few speculations, no," Korin said.

"But we're seriously **running out of evidence** and options!" Aeko said. "If we run out, we have to take a guess!"

"I know, but I ain't the one who did it," Kinzo said. " **I went to piss** and came straight back."

"There's nothing that says he didn't," Dai said.

"… Maemi, there's something weird here," Hisoka said. "I know there's **something I found** that'll pierce through the case."

[ END ]

 **[NEW TRUTH BULLET – HISOKA'S TESTIMONY: BATHROOM STATE]**

"There's nothin' saying it's _definitely_ me, right?" Kinzo said.

"Not beyond a few speculations, no," Korin said.

"But we're seriously **running out of evidence** and options!" Aeko said. "If we run out, we have to take a guess!"

"I know, but I ain't the one who did it," Kinzo said. " **I went to piss** and came back."

 **[TRUTH BULLET – HISOKA'S TESTIMONY: BATHROOM STATE]**

"That's wrong!" I shouted.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"You said you went to… uh, use the bathroom, right?" I asked.

"Yep. That's what I've been saying from the start." Kinzo placed his hands on his hips.

"But that's weird. I think a urinal would be used, one of the toilets used, or the sink used, if you really did use the bathroom," Hisoka said. "But everything in there was dry. There were no signs of use."

"Wha- You touched them all?" Aeko shouted, looking as though Hisoka just sprouted a second head.

"What?! No- ew, not with my bare hands! I used a paper towel!" Hisoka said. "But yeah- I checked everything, and it was all dry."

"A- A fuckin' tiny detail! Those things'd dry easily!" Kinzo continued.

"Maybe, but that quickly?" I asked. "We only got to investigate for about 20 minutes, and Hisoka went to check the bathroom at about the 15-minute mark."

"Seriously, I ain't the killer!" Kinzo said.

"Then can you please do something to prove it? Because right now, all the evidence is pointing to you," Kokuro said.

"W-Wait, all of it?" Kinzo said.

"She's exaggerating, but you're the most likely suspect," Airou said. "You left the dining hall, your voice is deep enough to pretend to be Seiryo, you're stupid enough to forget caller ID shows who's calling you-"

"Stick to the facts, Airou." Dai folded her arms.

"-… and you had the window of opportunity to do it, as you came back at the exact same time as Tae," Airou finished.

"Yeah, the exact same time! Wouldn't I have taken a little longer if I were the fuckin' culprit?" Kinzo said.

I don't think that's necessarily true, and that's because…

 **[Why would Kinzo be able to reach the dining hall at the same time as Tae?]**

Kinzo can teleport

 **Kinzo is a professional athlete**

Kinzo's talent is Ultimate Sprinter

Kinzo is ripped

"I've got this!"

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"Kinzo, you're the Ultimate Soccer Player, right?" I asked.

"Y-Yeah, so what?" Kinzo replied.

"It wouldn't be that much of a stretch to say you're preparing to go pro, right?" I asked another question.

"Why all the questions?" Kinzo raised his fist.

"Because we're trying to solve a crime and live," Delawyn said.

"A professional athlete would have no problems running the short distance from the kitchen to the dining hall, even if going the long way around," I explained.

"That…that's true, but I've noticed something," Hiroshi said.

"Huh? What?" Aeko asked.

"Well, it's a bit obvious, but…" Hiroshi pushed his fingers together, huffing into his respirator. "Tae came back to the kitchen, didn't she? So… how did Kinzo avoid getting seen by her?"

That's… Hiroshi's made a good point, but I'm sure there's a solution…!

 **[ NON-STOP DEBATE 4 – START! ]**

"How did Kinzo avoid getting seen by Tae?" Hiroshi asked. "If she caught him, she would've told us by now…"

"I didn't see him, and I'm sorry…" Tae said.

"He didn't come through the door between the kitchen and dining hall," Seiryo said.

"Maybe he _turned invisible_?" Korin said, though his grin indicated he was joking.

"He likely _hid_ ," Dai said.

"Maybe he _climbed up onto the ceiling_?" Aeko suggested.

"I'm telling you, I _never went to the kitchen_!" Kinzo protested.

"Maemi, I'm sure you can do this. You know which **response is correct.** " Delawyn folded her arms.

[ END ]

 **[NEW TRUTH BULLET – CORRECT AVOIDING TACTIC]**

"How did Kinzo avoid getting seen by Tae?" Hiroshi asked. "If she caught him, she would've told us by now…"

"I didn't see him, and I'm sorry…" Tae said.

"He didn't come through the door between the kitchen and dining hall," Seiryo said.

"Maybe he _turned invisible_?" Korin said, though his grin indicated he was joking.

"He likely _hid_ ," Dai said.

 **[TRUTH BULLET – CORRECT AVOIDING TACTIC]**

"I agree with you!" I shouted.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"He probably hid somewhere in the kitchen, so Tae wouldn't see him," I said.

"Hah! Say something that isn't obvious next time, Maemi," Kadiri said.

"She's been saying a lot of things that weren't obvious," Delawyn said.

"A-Anyway, I think that Kinzo hid in the kitchen and left once Tae was on her way to the dining hall," I said.

"Bullshit! Where would I even hide? There's nowhere to hide, my frame's way too bulky to fit in the cupboards or fridge AND leave fast enough!" Kinzo protested.

There was a space Kinzo could've hid…

 **[ SPOT SELECTION – START! ]**

[Between the refridgerator and the counters]

"Here!" I said.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"You could've hidden in that small groove between the fridge and the counter. It's big enough for you to fit, and the fridge's height would conceal you from the door to the kitchen," I said.

"Fucking hell… I didn't do it! I never hid there! I never went to the kitchen! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!" Kinzo started yelling and slamming his fists against the podium, and I gripped my own. His voice filled the room, and I felt my chest tightening again…

"… Are you alright, Maemi?" I heard one other voice just break through the commotion, and I glanced across the room at Hisoka once again, almost perfectly calm despite the screaming man beside him. I… I envied that, somewhat. "If you need to calm down again, I'll handle this…"

I glanced at the two, before taking a slow, deep breath. I straightened my spine out, before standing back upright.

"It's alright, Hisoka… I can handle it," I said. It was obvious Kinzo wasn't listening to me… so I had to find one last contradiction!

 **[ PANIC TALK ACTION – START! ]**

"I ain't the goddamn culprit!"

"Why won't you fuckin' believe me?"

"Dumb fuckin' accusations!"

"Your accusations ain't got a goal!"

 **{Tempo Up!}**

"It's not me, goddamnit!"

"Fuck off! Fuck off!"

"Stop it already!"

"It's all bullshit!"

 **{Tempo Up!}**

"Fuck, fuck, fuck!"

"Stop it!"

"Fuck!"

"Bullshit! BULLSHIT!"

" **You can't fucking prove I was in the kitchen! I never went there, and there's no proof!"**

 **|IN|SCRA|FLOOR|TCHES|**

 **|SCRA|TCHES|IN|FLOOR|**

"This is the end!" I shouted.

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"I found scratches in the floor in that section of the kitchen during the investigation," I said. "That would indicate you, and only you, left in a hurry."

"What?! How could you come to that end that out from a couple of fuckin' scratches?" Kinzo asked.

"The scratches were caused by something sharp. They actually etched past the linoleum and into the tile. Those marks would probably match up with your boots perfectly," I said.

"Soccer players wear special boots to keep their grip on the field," Korin said. "I've met many players of the sport in my time as a fashion designer and designed many different kinds of boots, but every single soccer boot I've designed has had those sharp grips."

"S-So… so what…?" Kinzo's face had paled.

"I believe you're wearing one of my designs right now. Call me a narcissist and an over-observant creep, but I do take note of when men wear my designs," Korin said. "And yes… if you pushed back hard enough, they could likely scratch linoleum off tiles. Such as when you're sprinting away."

"Well, what do you have to say about that, Kinzo?" Kadiri asked, twisting one of her hair locks around her finger.

"I… But, Mioko…" Kinzo stammered.

"I think that's his confession." Delawyn folded her arms.

"Alright… I'll go over the case, from beginning to end, so there are no doubts," I said. Kinzo collapsed to the floor as I had previously… It was impossible not to feel bad for him, despite what he'd done. But… I still had a job to do. I had to finish the class trial. I couldn't save Kinzo or Mokichi… but I could still save everybody else.

 **[ CLIMAX INFERENCE: START! ]**

"The crime began at around 7:30am this morning. Nearly everyone gathered in the dining hall, as per usual, to discuss things over breakfast. Kokuro and Seiryo were exempt from the dining hall, for their own reasons.

"Tae had arrived at the dining hall early, and already had a round of coffee prepared for everyone, which everybody took. That was probably when the killer got their idea to commit murder and frame Tae for it – the whole crime reeks of being spur-of-the-moment, rather than meticulously planned.

"Aeko left around the same time that Tae went back into the kitchen to prepare a second round of coffee. At the same time, the culprit stood up, said they needed to use the bathroom, and left the kitchen. They then walked to the bathroom, but didn't use it to… uh, do their business as they'd claimed. Instead, they called Tae's phone, which would've easily been their fatal move if Tae was checking call ID. However, Tae had gotten so used to never checking the number and just answering her phone, that she didn't even realise who called her.

"The culprit then asked her to meet them in the courtyard to discuss something, and that they'd meet her there in about a minute. However, because the culprit's voice is huskier than Seiryo's, it instead came across as him having a cold… which we later proved couldn't be true.

"Tae left the kitchen and went to the courtyard as instructed by the call, leaving the kitchen clear for the culprit to enter and poison one of her coffees. They waited until Aeko went into the dining hall again, before heading towards the kitchen.

"The culprit then pulled out the rat poison from the cupboard – we later learned it was actually cyanide. The culprit emptied some of the poison into the drink – enough to be fatal, but not enough to be noticeable, before stirring it up so that it looked like a normal cup of coffee.

"The killer planned to leave the kitchen through the side door after that and re-enter the group from the hallway door to the dining hall with no suspicion of their deed, but heard Tae coming back when the library door opened. She was irritated and out of patience, after waiting 3 minutes for someone who never came. Instead, and in a panic, they elected to hide in the space between the fridge and the counters, but as they scrambled to their hiding place, they knocked both the rat poison off the counter entirely, and some of the coffee out of one of the cups and onto the counter. Tae didn't see them or the spill of coffee on the edge of the counter, and the poison's resting place was behind the middle counter out of her line of sight.

" Tae took the coffees out to the others and the culprit sprinted out of the kitchen, leaving the scratchy footprint behind, managing to make it back when Tae was giving out the coffees again. The killer could make it look as though they'd just come back from the bathroom, as due to their talent, their heartrate wouldn't elevate much from a 15-metre sprint and make them look tired.

"Tae gave the cyanide-laced coffee to Mokichi, none the wiser about its true contents. Mokichi… drank it without a second thought. The cyanide laced into his bloodstream almost instantly, and with no access to a cure, he died shortly after. The culprit had killed someone, and made Tae look like his killer.

" _ **This is your crime, isn't it, Kinzo Takashi, the Ultimate Soccer Player?"**_

 **[ BREAK! ]**

"So… Kinzo, did I miss anything?" I asked.

"I… I…" Kinzo barely stammered out his reply.

"Then let's vote," Kadiri said.

"Righty-o! Everyone, take out your student phones and get ready to vote! Your classmates' names are listed on your phone. Double-tap the classmate you wish to vote for! Also, not voting is such a sad thing… It shows you really don't care about who the culprit is and about your own life. It's also against the rules, so be sure to vote!" Monokuma announced.

"That's not listed in the rulebook," Seiryo said.

"Not yet, anyway! But for the time being, until it's a permanent addition to the rules, it's a temporary addition to the rules!" Monokuma announced. "Now hurry up and vote!"

I took out my phone and scrolled through the names, before double-tapping 'Kinzo Takashi'. I heard a noise above me, followed by several more. My eyes were cast upwards to a large, real-time billboard of the votes, tallying 14 for Kinzo to 1 for Seiryo.

 **[ CLASS TRIAL – END. ]**

Monokuma leapt from the stand, landing on the ground in front of us all.

"You're absolutely correct! The killer of Mokichi Hatsu, the Ultimate Pilot, is none other than Kinzo Takashi, the Ultimate Soccer Player!" Monokuma announced, before giving a hearty laugh.

Kinzo stood in stunned silence, staring blankly at shaking hands. The rest of us stood in stunned silence as well. Not one pair of eyes wasn't on Kinzo. Though we'd just solved his case, I… I couldn't believe he'd just kill somebody. I couldn't believe someone would just give in to Monokuma's demands. I couldn't believe… I couldn't believe someone could prove me wrong, so horribly, horribly wrong.

"… Geez, you guys are awfully quiet. Usually everybody's begging for a motive, saying sappy goodbyes, yadda yadda. Somehow, this is even more boring," Monokuma said.

"S-Shut up! You gave me that fuckin' letter, you know damn well who fuckin' sent it!" Kinzo yelled suddenly, his fists clenched into balls.

"Kinzo… who did send your letter?" I asked, taking care to keep my voice gentle, and taking a step towards him.

"… Mioko…" Kinzo replied.

"Mioko…?" I repeated.

"Mioko Sugimoto. She's… she's Hideyoshi Sugimoto's sister," Kinzo said.

"The manager of your club, no doubt," Korin said.

Kinzo nodded slowly.

"And… Mioko. She's also my girlfriend," Kinzo explained. "She's… she's in the fuckin' hospital. The letter said she was in a car crash when she heard about our disappearance on the radio. She couldn't look for me, and I…"

"… chose to kill to find her," Airou said, stepping forth. I held my hand out in front of him, preventing him from getting closer.

"I had no fuckin' choice! I have to find her!" Kinzo yelled. "I wouldn't do it this way if there was another! I never fuckin' wanted to kill somebody, but I had to find Mioko!"

"We've barely been missing for a week. The semester of Hope's Peak Academy started three days ago. The police are likely still in the process of-" Airou continued, and I finally turned around.

"God! For two seconds, can you shut your mouth, Airou?" I snapped. "Kinzo's… he's…"

"About to die," Dai said. "I see no reason to ignore that."

"No… I still gotta find Mioko! I gotta find her, I gotta make sure she's alright!" Kinzo started to breathe rapidly, fists clenched tightly. "I'm not gonna die!"

"You want to see Mioko again?" Monokuma stood between me and Kinzo, looking up at the latter.

"I… I gotta! I gotta fuckin' make sure she's okay!" Kinzo said. "And I'm not gonna die until I do! I gotta fuckin' see Mioko!"

"Okie dokie! Here she is!" Monokuma took Kinzo's phone for a moment, sliding the screen around, before handing it back to Kinzo.

…

…

Kinzo took the phone back with a hopeful light in his eyes.

But when his eyes fell upon the screen…

…

… that light disappeared.

The phone dropped from his hands, and landed face down on the floor.

"Kinzo… ?" Hiroshi asked, pushing his fingers together.

Kinzo didn't reply.

"I… I can assume what you saw. I'm so sorry, Kinzo," I said.

"… I gotta save her…" He spoke up once again, finally.

"Kinzo…" I said, but he once again, refused to listen.

"Ugh, I'm bored of this now," Monokuma said. "I think it's time we got to the fun part of this little trial – the execution!"

"There's not gonna fuckin' be an execution…" Kinzo said.

"Now then, I've prepared a very special punishment for the Ultimate Soccer Player, Kinzo Takahashi!" Monokuma announced.

"I'm gonna save Mioko… There's no way I'll just accept any old shit you show me and take it lying down!"

"Let's give it everything we've got!"

Kinzo began sprinting for the elevator. "I'm not gonna fucking die!"

"IT'S PUNISHMENT TIME!"

" **I've gotta fuckin' save her!** "

[ KINZO TAKASHI HAS BEEN FOUND GUILTY. ]

[ TIME FOR THE PUNISHMENT! ]

Kinzo sprinted for the exit, pushing past his classmates. Something shot past in pursuit of him. Kinzo reached the elevators, climbing inside, frantically demanding that the doors shut. They didn't even close a little bit, and the pursuing figure caught up. A manacle closed around Kinzo's neck, and yanked him violently back through the courtroom and down a hallway. The manacle's chain eventually detached and let Kinzo go on a soccer field, with a pressure-boarded soccer goal behind him.

 **[ Ultimate Soccer Player in: 1-1 Score - Overtime! ]**

Monokuma stood at the other end of the field, kicking a ball towards the goal. Almost instinctively, Kinzo kicked it back. Monokuma kicked it once again, aiming further away into the goal. Kinzo returned the kick once again. And Monokuma kicked it once again, aiming even further away.

Kick.

Kick.

Kick.

Kick.

Kick.

Soon, the two were moving so fast, you could barely make exactly where they stood out. They battled intensely, neither one willing to let up on the other. Kinzo's determination was a force to be reckoned with, and at this moment, he believed with all his heart that Monokuma couldn't possibly keep this up forever. Eventually, Monokuma would screw up. That thought fuelled Kinzo's determination, and put him on top of the world.

But nobody stays on top forever.

His elevated heart rate and the short bursts of intense movement were finally wearing him down, and amidst the blurs, Monokuma kicked it back again for what seemed like the 75th time. Only this time, Kinzo's kick came a few inches too high. Kinzo's kick missed the ball, and the ball struck the pressure board behind him.

The scoreboard above him lit up, announcing the scores as 1-2, before a fanfare played, announcing Monokuma as the victor. Celebratory confetti and lightning appeared on the scoreboard, shortly before 2 very real lightning strikes came through the roof of the stadium, attracted to the metal around Kinzo's neck. The lightning strikes fried him instantly, and his body dropped down, dead in an instant from the strikes.

…

We all stood there in dumbfounded and horrified shock. I could hear the laboured, terrified breaths of Tae and Aeko behind me. I think all of us could hear Hiroshi's borderline screaming.

For Kokuro and Seiryo… as far as we knew, it was the first time watching someone die. For the rest of us, it was the second time in only a few hours.

Mokichi Hatsu, and now Kinzo Takashi… were both dead. There was nothing we could do to change that. We can't bring back the dead.

Eventually, one of us spoke up.

"… We should head back, now," Delawyn suggested.

"How… why would you say that?" Tae asked, wiping her eyes. "I, we… we just saw two people die in front of us…!"

"I know. I don't have the same perspective of how that must feel when you work in a coffee shop, vs making your living of watching and causing final moments," Delawyn said.

"Hey, are you trying to hurt Tae's feelings?" Aeko asked.

"I meant what I said with sincerity, and my intentions weren't to be condescending. I stated a fact; a barista is unlikely to watch someone die. An assassin must. But we still need to head back, and verify a few things," Delawyn explained.

"Such as?" Kadiri asked.

"If Mokichi's corpse is still there, we need to move it elsewhere. I… don't think we'd appreciate eating with the corpse of our classmate," Delawyn explained.

"Ah, to answer that," Monokuma interjected. "Don't worry! I've cleaned up any and all dastardly corpses for you guys, and I'll continue to do so as long as you make 'em!"

"Well, that answers that," Korin said, scratching at his goatee.

"I… also think we should sleep early today," Delawyn said. "If you can sleep, that is. Otherwise, just lying down will help."

"And if someone tries to attack us while we're resting?" Airou said.

"You have a lock on your door, don't you?" Dai said.

"And I think it's obvious we shouldn't share beds if we're worried about them trying to kill us," Delawyn explained. "One more thing… the cyanide. I think I'll keep it in my room."

"And what makes you think that's even a remotely acceptable thing to do?" Airou said. "Letting you be the only one with access to a poison that killed dear Mokichi nearly instantly?"

"I'd be the only one with access to the poison. You, I, and everybody else knows that if I were the only one with access to the poison, in future cases, I'd be the only one that could use it," Delawyn said. "And that would make me the clear and obvious culprit. Any questions?"

None of us raised our hands or spoke. Delawyn nodded slowly.

"… Then… we should go," Kenji said, eyes lingering back on the smouldering remains of Kinzo for a moment, before turning back to the elevator, wheeling himself in. The Uesaka siblings followed him in, followed by Kokuro… and eventually, we were all heading into the elevator.

The elevator carried us back up, the 14 of us remaining standing in almost absolute silence. Korin held Satoko close, giving her reassuring pats on the back. Tae held on to Aeko's hand. Dai and Kadiri had a whispered conversation to each other. I could make out Kenji sniffling, eyes gazing at the floor. Airou and Kokuro stood isolated alone. Seiryo and Hiroshi stood close to each other. And I stood between Delawyn and Hisoka, in the corner of the elevator.

"How are you holding up? You had me worried back at the trial," Hisoka said. I nodded slowly.

"Yeah, I… thank you for helping me back there," I said.

"Hey, you looked like you needed a moment to recollect yourself. Considering we're on opposite sides of the courtroom… I couldn't be there to comfort you physically, so taking your lead over everybody else, for even a few moments, is the least I could do," Hisoka said.

"Don't either of you sell your contributions short. Both of you helped us find the culprit," Delawyn said, before lowering her voice to a whisper. "… Do either of you have any idea how Monokuma could've cleaned a body up while being away physically?"

"I can't think of any reason…" I confessed.

"Me neither," Hisoka said. We both kept our voices to that same whisper.

"There aren't any entrances or exits that a normal human could get to. So, how did they remove the corpse?" Delawyn asked.

"Wouldn't the Mononurses handle something like that?" I asked.

"That's a fair point, but the Mononurses appear to be simple-script AI robots that have one job – punish rulebreakers. Someone would have to be giving them that command." Delawyn said.

"I'm not following," Hisoka said.

"I think whoever our captor is, they're hiding among us. And there are two places they could. Hidden passageways in a secret room, or right in front of us," Delawyn whispered.

"I see… that seems risky, telling us. What if it was one of us?" I asked.

"I don't think that if there is a mastermind, they'd be so stupid to point out it could be them in front of someone throwing that suggestion out there," Delawyn replied.

"Fair point…" I replied.

The elevator doors opened in front of us, revealing the courtyard. We all began to file out, one by one.

The first thing we all did was check the dining hall to confirm Monokuma's words…

… Monokuma told the truth. Mokichi's body was nowhere in sight. It was like… it was like he never existed. It also meant that…

… Delawyn's theory had some truth to it.

I shook my head, heading back to my room.

"Maemi," I heard a voice call out, turning my head back to see Seiryo.

"What's up, Seiryo?" I asked.

"It's about how you acted at the trial," Seiryo replied, as the rest of our classmates began filing into their rooms.

"How I acted? Can you be more specific?" I asked.

"Your… well, I can't describe it lightly. Your breakdown," Seiryo replied. "Is everything alright?"

"Y-Yeah, it's just…" I said, grabbing onto my wrist. "I've been that way since the start of junior high school."

"Do you want to talk about it?" Seiryo asked.

"It's…" I began, taking a deep breath, before continuing. "I've had it since junior high, and I'd managed to control it before entering Hope's Peak, but now… it's this situation. I'm stressed out of my wits, like the rest of us are, but it's resulting in a lot of breakdowns for me…"

"It's okay. Just breathe. You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," Seiryo said.

I shook my head, before answering him.

"It's an anxiety condition."

 **[ CHAPTER 1 : END ]**

 **SURVIVORS: 14**


	6. Chapter 2 - Daily Life

**[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

"To be honest, I've always wondered what it would be like to be a vampire bat."

"What would all my merchandising be like? Would I still be as lovable if I was a bat?"

"Actually, bats are very cute. Did you know that they figure out what's around them by making various clicking and screaming noises?"

"It's a bit like college students, except they scream due to stress."

"Bats are pretty cute, though. I'd love to be one."

"I wonder what my mother would say, though, if I came home one day as a vampire bat?"

"Would she still love me? Who knows?"

"Maybe I'd just eat her again."

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

…

I found myself struggling to get to sleep tonight.

There were many things playing into that.

The whole situation we were in…

… and every time I tried to manually shut my eyes, as if they'd been burned into the inside of my eyelids, I saw the deaths of Mokichi and Kinzo.

Mokichi was poisoned by Kinzo, who we had to watch suffocate and die while we were helpless to watch…

… and then Kinzo was executed for doing so, and once more, we couldn't do anything to stop it.

At this point… confessing my anxiety condition to Seiryo was the least of my problems. It barely registered as a problem.

Actually, it felt good to get it off my chest. So that at least **someone** knew why I broke down at the trial.

I groaned, raising myself to my feet. I felt so tired, and yet I couldn't sleep. I decided that I could just wander around the building until I found the will to sleep. Maybe get a book or watch a movie in the library. Those were always my mother's recommendations when I couldn't sleep. Well, she'd suggest a glass of warm milk, too, but the cafeteria is closed at night, so I couldn't do that.

I gave my hair a quick brush and put it back in its buns and twin tails, before leaving the room.

It took literally less than five seconds for Monokuma to show up after I'd closed my door behind me.

"What do you think you're doing?!" Monokuma demanded, and I stifled a shriek as I stumbled backwards into my door.

"A-Are we not allowed to walk around at night time?" I asked, hands over my chest.

"Geez, I call you guys lunatics, but it turns out you might actually be one," Monokuma commented. "Of course, you can walk around during night time!"

"T-That… D-Don't call me that! And you couldn't already know about that, I only told Seiryo!" I protested.

"You know the intercoms have microphones that go both ways, right? I can hear every conversation you have with each other," Monokuma interjected. "But that's not why I think you're a lunatic. It's so rude to call someone that for having a disorder! Downright terrible! Un-bear-able!"

"Then… why?" I asked.

"You're still in your underwear!" Monokuma pointed a paw to me, and I looked down. I… was, admittedly, just in my bra and underpants. I somehow didn't notice.

"R-Right!" I felt my face flush with blood in embarrassment.

"Oh, don't worry. You're not breaking any rules, I just thought you should know. Anyway, it's not like I care. I've already seen you completely nude in the shower," Monokuma chuckled.

"H-Hey!" I protested again, taking a step towards Monokuma, but he dashed off into the hallway before I could follow him… and honestly, I felt too tired to do so.

Shrugging, I ventured towards the library. I wasn't completely nude, so it wouldn't matter if someone saw me… I hoped, anyway. Besides, who else would be up at this hour?

I entered the library. For a moment, and for a reason I couldn't explain, I expected to see Mokichi there, nose buried in a book… but no, of course he wouldn't be. I shook my head, and started browsing through the shelves. I pushed through various fictional books, finding nothing of interest…

Before I knew it entirely, I was in the non-fiction section of the library. Various encyclopaedias slipped under my fingers, various titles that didn't jump out at me. It continued like that for a while, until I reached the T section.

I frowned as my eyes finally caught a book – titled The Tragedy: A Report on The Most Despair-Inducing Incident in the History of Mankind. The title rang a few bells, but I couldn't quite place my finger on where or why… Even though it felt like the answer was trying to scream at me.

I grabbed the book off the shelf, deciding to take it to my room and read it. I headed back out into the hallway and into my room, turning on the light and throwing myself onto my bed to read.

 _The Most Despair Inducing Incident in The History of Mankind, often shortened to The Tragedy, was an event that almost ended the world. Beginning in 2009, the Tragedy's origins were in the prestigious high school of Hope's Peak Academy._

I frowned. Weren't we supposed to be attending Hope's Peak? And I never heard anything about a Tragedy or the end of the world…

I decided to continue reading.

 _The Tragedy was mainly caused by an event, the mass suicide of Hope's Peak's reserve course program, and by a group called the Remnants of Despair, led by Ultimate Fashionista Junko Enoshima. The Remnants of Despair caused worldwide riots, eventually leading to the downfall of humanity and the end of the world, an event leaving humanity almost on the brink of extinction. The Remnants of Despair were also responsible for the Killing Game of Class 78. Class 78 were brainwashed into forgetting why they locked themselves into the academy, were unable to be rescued, and were forced to kill one another. One of Enoshima's classmates, Makoto Naegi, was able to put an end to the killing game, and Enoshima ended her own life before Naegi and the other survivors escaped._

Wait…

Makoto Naegi?!

"Isn't he…?"

 **Isn't he supposed to be our headmaster?**

The questions in my head soon sent it into overdrive, and I shoved the book under my bed and my body under my covers. The questions spun in my head. I knew Hope's Peak needed to be rebuilt, but… the end of the world? And it originated _from_ Hope's Peak? How did we never hear about it? 2009 was ten years ago. I don't think we'd simply forget about the end of the world…

Those questions eventually overwhelmed me into sleep.

…

…

…

"Ahem- attention, all lunatics! It is now 7am! The cafeteria and dining hall have been unlocked," Monokuma announced. "Please, let's all have a wonderful day together!" The monitors shut off as Monokuma finished his morning announcement.

I pushed myself back out of bed, rubbing my forehead. As I started putting my clothes on, my mind began wandering back to the book I'd found in the library.

Something was strange. I still didn't think I'd just forget about the end of the world, especially if the Headmaster had such a vital role to play in it. As I pulled my socks over my feet, I began wondering if I should ask everybody else…

My mind wandered back to the first time we met Monokuma. Delawyn… she'd mentioned Makoto Naegi at that time. Did she know about the Tragedy?

I was about to push open my door, when my doorbell rang.

I put on a smile, shoving the thoughts out of my head for the time being, and opened the door to see Hisoka standing on the other side.

"Ah, good morning, Hisoka!" I said, stepping out of my room and into the hallway.

"Morning, Maemi," Hisoka said. "How are you holding up?"

"Better than expected," I said. I hoped that it was a lie that my smile could convince him of.

"That's good," Hisoka said. I was pretty sure he bought my lie. "Um, Tae's already in the kitchen starting on breakfast. Delawyn went in with her and took the rat poison to her room."

"Right, so nobody else can use it," I said. "We should probably greet Tae and ask how she is."

"Yeah, I agree," Hisoka said, before heading off towards the kitchen, hands locked behind his head. I followed behind.

We entered the kitchen, and I could easily smell the various breakfast foods and coffee Tae had been preparing. As usual, it smelled wonderful.

"Morning, Tae," Hisoka greeted, and Tae snapped her head up towards us and away from the pan she was holding.

"Good morning!" Tae greeted, before flipping something inside the pan – a pancake. I decided to walk over closer.

"What flavour pancakes are you making?" I asked.

"I'm using both regular pancake batter and chocolate batter," Tae replied. Now that I was closer, I could see what she meant. Inside the pan was a pancake in the shape of simple cartoon cat, with dark brown outlines and a light brown centre.

"Aaw, how cute!" I exclaimed.

"I know, right? When you look at a cute cat or a cute girl, you can feel your worries melt away…" Tae said, before turning back to the pancake. "Though not everyone likes girls like I do, so I thought I'd stick with cats."

"Not everyone's a cat person, either…" Hisoka said.

"I know, but what horrible person looks at a cat and says, 'It's not cute'? I don't even think Airou is capable of something so horrible," Tae said.

I opened my mouth to tell her not to say those sorts of things behind his back, but then again, he did try to insist that she committed murder only yesterday. So, I kept it shut.

"You think the others'll be in the dining hall soon?" Hisoka asked.

"Probably, the morning announcement played about fifteen minutes ago…" Tae said. "Someone's got to be there."

"I'll go check," I announced, before heading through the door into the dining hall.

Most of the early risers were already there… Delawyn, Dai, Hiroshi, and Seiryo all sat around the central table collection, though I could see Hiroshi shivering from here.

"Morning!" I greeted, waving to the group.

"Ah, good morning, Maemi," Dai replied, her head perking up.

"Y-Yeah, morning!" Hiroshi said, trying to force a smile.

"You don't have to force a smile for me, Hiroshi… I'm guessing that yesterday's still on your mind too," I said.

"W-Well, yesterday and just the last few days altogether…" Hiroshi said.

"That's understandable. The situation is stressful… though the only similar thing is the Stockholm situation. Let's hope we don't develop sympathy and appreciation towards our captor," Seiryo said.

I immediately remembered the book I grabbed from the library last night… I decided that I needed to tell somebody about it. And right now, there was only one person I was _sure_ wasn't the mastermind – why would the mastermind bring up their own existence?

I was confident about Hisoka's innocence, but I couldn't be 100% sure… though I would tell him eventually.

"Hey, Delawyn, can we talk outside for a bit?" I asked.

Without a word, Delawyn stood up. I headed towards the door closest to the dormitories, heading into the blank space in the hallway. I could hear Delawyn following close behind.

I occasionally glanced up as more people entered the dining hall – Aeko, Korin, and Satoko entered almost as soon as we began speaking.

"Why did you want to speak with me?" Delawyn asked, keeping her voice to a hushed whisper.

"Um, well, I found something while in the library last night… I couldn't sleep, so I went through the books. I found a book detailing an event called The Tragedy," I said, in the same whispered tone. "Do you remember anything about that?"

"I'm afraid I don't," Delawyn replied.

"That's really weird…" I said.

"How so?" Delawyn asked.

"Well… the book said that The Tragedy was an event that originated from Hope's Peak Academy, where we'd enrolled at. It also said that it involved the end of the world," I replied. "I know it had to be rebuilt, but… something like this?"

"Where did you find this book again?" Delawyn asked.

"I said before, I found it in the library," I replied.

"I meant what section," Delawyn said.

"Oh- right. Non-fiction," I said.

"It could've been moved there by Monokuma…" Delawyn theorised.

"Well, it could've, but it referenced the principal by name, Makoto Naegi," I said.

"… I'll come to your room tonight. I want to see this book," Delawyn said, before raising her voice again. "… Anyway. For now, we should go back to the dining hall. Everyone else is already there."

"Yeah, we should," I agreed. Delawyn turned around and walked into the dining hall just as Kadiri passed us, and I followed her in.

I began mentally counting those of us who were there. Myself, Delawyn, Kadiri, Aeko, Kokuro, Hiroshi, Seiryo, Kenji, Airou, Korin, Satoko, Dai, and Hisoka. We were only missing Tae at this point… and as I could see Hiroshi digging into a stack of pancakes and Aeko guzzling a cup of coffee, I could assume she was still in the process of making breakfast.

I pulled up a chair next to Hisoka, reaching over and grabbing one of the pancakes. As I scooped a few strawberries to eat with it, Tae came back out with trays of coffee in both of her hands and eight small bowls on a tray on her head – four filled with rice and the other four full of miso soup.

"Sorry I'm taking so long! I thought we could use a better breakfast today…" Tae said, sliding the coffee trays onto the table before reaching up to the tray on her head.

"Nobody snuck in and poisoned them this time, did they?" Airou said with a chuckle.

"You've just got no tact, do you?" Dai said, shaking her head.

"Geez- Mokichi and Kinzo died less than two fucking days ago," Hisoka said. "At least wait a bit before you crack jokes if you're gonna be a heartless bastard, okay?"

"And here I thought maybe a little humour would be appreciated at breakfast, considering the atmosphere." Airou tossed his side ponytail behind his shoulder with a flick of his head.

"I'm just gonna go get the fish and come back," Tae said exasperatedly, before ducking back into the kitchen.

"There's time for joking around, Airou, but right now isn't that time," Hiroshi said.

"Bah. Lighten up a little," Airou said.

"He's right, you know," I said.

"And I repeat my previous statement," Airou said with a smile.

"I'm back with the fish!" Tae said, several plates with grilled salmon in her arms. She placed them gently on the table in front of us and took a seat next to Dai.

"And that makes fourteen," Kadiri said.

"Wow. The actress can count," Kokuro scoffed.

"And the circus freak can say something incredibly rude," Kadiri retorted.

"I'm not a freak." Kokuro crossed her legs over.

"You dress in nothing but black and white. Even your eyes are some horrid white colour, somehow," Kadiri said.

"We can't all be constantly photoshopped and given the best angles like you," Kokuro huffed.

"A-Anyway, we're all here!" Hiroshi quickly said, clapping his hands together.

"Those of us who are left, anyway…" Kenji said.

There was silence among us for a few moments. Sixteen yesterday, fourteen today. We couldn't let that fourteen become less again.

"… Should we say a few words to honour their memory?" Dai asked.

"What memory?" Airou replied. "We barely knew them. Why bother?"

"I wish I could understand how your mind works sometimes, Airou," Korin remarked. "You've got a handsome face, but such a sadistic mind attached to it."

"You got it in one, Korin," Airou replied.

"Memory! Mokichi and Kinzo! Should we do something?" I quickly blurted out, trying to get everyone back on topic.

"I think we should. Airou, if you don't wanna do it with us, then you better go," Hisoka said.

"Very well, then," Airou said. He stood up, pushed his chair in, and left through the hallway door.

"Okay… should I start? And how should we do this?" I asked.

"We should all hold hands! Or if you're not comfortable with hands, maybe the sleeves of the shirt?" Aeko said.

"Okay, and then what?" Seiryo asked.

"Uh… I dunno. I'm basing a lot of it on shows filmed at or showing at my aquarium," Aeko admitted.

"A prayer for the dead, I believe would be what we should do," Dai said, holding her hands out to the sides. Kadiri took one, and Tae took the other.

"Do you know how to lead one?" Kenji asked.

"Not… particularly," Dai replied.

"I do." Delawyn took my left hand as she said this, and Hisoka took my right hand.

"You pray for the dead, Delawyn?" Korin asked.

"… Those I'm paid to kill had lives and families as well," Delawyn said. "Is it really that unbelievable that I'd want to respect them?"

"You… have a point," Korin admitted, taking Satoko's hand. The two were at a separate table, so neither of them took another.

"It's not necessarily a religious prayer, just a farewell message to the departed. I'll start us off. Close your eyes," Delawyn instructed, and we all did as she asked.

"… Mokichi Hatsu, and Kinzo Takashi. Two men who were killed in this world far too soon. May they find peace, wherever they are now," Delawyn said.

We all nodded silently. Even our breath was silent. And for a moment, we all remained in that silence.

After that moment passed, slowly, we all opened our eyes…

"What kind of occult bullshit are you doing?"

Monokuma stood on the table in front of us, a piece of grilled fish in his paws.

"Hey! That's for everybody else!" Tae yelled, pushing herself out of her seat.

Monokuma's response was to lick the fish all the way across.

"… Was, for everybody else." Tae sunk back into her chair.

"Don't look so sad! Don't you know bears love fish?" Monokuma replied, pointing the fish towards Tae, before eating the entire thing in one go.

"Great. In the coming days, he's going to smell like rotting fish," Kokuro groaned.

"Well, it'll be clear as day when he's coming," Airou chuckled, standing at the door.

"And now you're all here, I can make my announcement!" Monokuma announced.

"There's no way there's a body discovery announcement. We're all here." Hisoka said.

"Not a body discovery announcement! I'd announce it on the monitor if there was a dead body! Now, first, an update to the rules! Based on yesterday's temporary rule of "You gotta vote for somebody", that rule is now permanent! Check your phones for more info!" Monokuma announced. Kadiri's phone was out of her pocket in an instant, scrolling through.

"… New Rule 8. All participants in the class trial must vote." Kadiri kicked her legs up onto the table.

"Yep, yep! Gotta vote for somebody!" Monokuma said.

"… What else?" Kenji asked.

"Oh, that's easy! The second floor is now open! Unfortunately, there's no wheelchair access, so you're just gonna hafta make do with this one, Kenji," Monokuma announced.

"Joy." Kenji sunk in his wheelchair.

"I can help you up, if you want," Seiryo said.

"Nah. It's fine," Kenji said.

"Yeah, whatever. There's something else that opened in the kitchen, too. Have fun exploring!" Monokuma left the room, leaving us with the knowledge that our living space has expanded.

"Why would he open up the next floor now?" Korin wondered aloud, as he stood up.

"My guess? His idea of a present for passing the trial," Dai replied. She pushed herself to her feet as well.

"Well, let's go look," I said. "Uh, Kenji, are you going to be alright?"

"Yeah," Kenji muttered.

"I'll carry your wheelchair up, if you like," Seiryo offered.

"… Like I said, I'll stay downstairs. May as well explore the one new location on the floor I can get to without embarrassing myself," Kenji said.

"Okay, so… then the rest of us can go up," I said.

"I'll stay down with Kenji," Seiryo offered.

"After what happened yesterday?" Kadiri tilted her head.

"Well, if Kenji does turn up dead, and everyone else is accounted for on the second floor, then it makes it pretty obvious who the culprit is," Seiryo said.

"Fine, point taken," Kadiri said, waving her hands dismissively.

"Alright, then, the rest of us are going up to the second floor," Hisoka said.

"Race you there!" Aeko said, before bolting out of the dining hall.

"Hey, come back! No fair!" Hiroshi said, before following her out.

The rest of us left the hall without making a race out of it, heading up the stairs. Kenji and Seiryo went into the kitchen, on the other hand.

I arrived on the second floor… and I saw the floor open down the middle of the large hallway, with railings on either side.

I also saw Aeko leaning over the railing, feet anchored to the floor and hips pressed against the railing. Her torso, arms, and head were on the other side of the railing, holding tightly to a pair of hands – and judging by their colour and everyone else's location, I could guess those hands belonged to Hiroshi.

"Hey, I can see the bedrooms from here!" Hiroshi's voice echoed through the two floors.

"Nggh… can someone help me help him up? I'm not strong enough!" Aeko called back.

Dai rushed forth, grabbing Aeko around the waist, and pulled both her and Hiroshi away from the railing. Though Dai remained standing, Aeko and Hiroshi were sprawled across the floor.

"So, it's safe to assume that the opening there shows the first floor?" Korin asked.

"Yeah, I think so," Hiroshi replied.

I then watched Kokuro approach the railing, turn her back to it, hook her right knee over it, and let her body hang over the railing, staring out into whatever was below.

"… I can see the staircase we went up," Kokuro called back to us.

"How? By the direction you're facing, you should be staring at the front door to the asylum," Kadiri asked.

"I'm the Ultimate Acrobat, you cancerous twit," Kokuro retorted. I heard a knocking on the floor near her. "Anyway, I can see the staircase and the doors to the kitchen, dining hall, and library."

I watched Kokuro swing herself back up and over the railing, standing up straight once more.

"Whoa, you're so flexible, Kokuro!" Tae exclaimed, her eyes lighting up.

"Yeah, I know," Kokuro replied. "… Are we gonna look around or what?"

"Y-Yeah, we are. Let's start that," I said. "Groups of two?"

"Three," Delawyn said. "There's twelve of us, and four groups of 3 can watch over each other better than 6 groups of two."

"But what about Seiryo and Kenji?" Hiroshi asked.

"I don't think either of them are going to hurt the other," Delawyn said. "And they can keep a better eye on each other on the first floor, anyway."

"Alright, I'll go with Hiroshi and Tae!" Aeko said, pumping her fists.

"And I think it'd be best if we stuck together, Maemi," Delawyn said. "For the time being, anyway."

"Okay… Hisoka, did you want to come with us?" I asked.

"Accompanying two cute girls? Can't say no to that!" Hisoka beamed.

"… Right," Delawyn replied.

"I'm sticking with Satoko," Korin said, with Satoko nodding in agreement.

"Dibs on going with them," Kokuro quickly said.

"We didn't-" Korin began, but was cut off.

"I suppose that leaves me with Kadiri and Airou," Dai said.

Korin let out a sigh, before smiling again. "Very well. Let's begin exploring, friends."

I turned to Delawyn and Hisoka, finding them already halfway down the hall to our right.

"H-Hey, wait up!" I called out, jogging to reach them, catching up just as they opened the door.

Hisoka pushed the door open, and on the other side, we saw some sort of balcony. Rather than the metal railings on the floor outside, we saw wooden railings. The three of us walked ahead in unison, before overlooking the balcony. And below, a floor lower, we could see…

… A pool. We saw a pool, with clear and invigorating water. We also saw Kenji and Seiryo nearby.

"Hey, Kenji, Seiryo!" I waved to them from the top, leaning over the railing and waving them over.

"Ah, so there is a door to that balcony…" Seiryo said, waving back.

"Yep! You guys find anything?" Hisoka said, leaning over the balcony next to me.

"The door from the kitchen leads to a hallway, which leads to two changing rooms," Seiryo explained. "One for the guys, one for the girls. Just enough to give nonbinary people an existential crisis."

"And the pool door, as you can see…" Kenji added, pointing to the door.

"I see… and I'm guessing that's all that's new on the first floor," Delawyn said.

"Looks like it." Kenji folded his arms and slid down slightly in his wheelchair.

"Very well. Hisoka, Maemi, I'd like a word with you," Delawyn said, pulling us over to the corner of the balcony.

"Shouldn't we wait for them to leave?" Hisoka asked.

"You kept your voice down yesterday around everybody else. Keep it down again," Delawyn said, hushing her voice. "I want you to come with me to Maemi's room tonight."

"H-Hey, I never agreed to this," I said, though I hushed myself, too.

"He's got a right to know. I spoke with you both yesterday, and as far as I'm concerned, the three of us are in this together," Delawyn said.

"Uh… what're we doing?" Hisoka asked.

"Maemi knows more than I do. I know only what she told me," Delawyn said.

"U-Uh… Um…" I stammered, wringing my hands together.

"It's alright, Maemi. It's alright," Hisoka said, and I felt his hand close gently around my left wrist. The contact was what I needed to calm down, and take a breath to compose myself.

"… If it's alright, I'll tell you then," I replied after a moment. "For now, I think we should catch up with everyone else…"

"Makes sense. Let's go," Hisoka said. He walked out, with Delawyn and I walking behind.

"… Why didn't you tell him?" Delawyn whispered to me as we walked out.

"I… I don't think he's the mastermind, but with you, I at least _know_ you're not the mastermind." I wringed my hands together.

"… I see," Delawyn said, but didn't say any more.

We walked back out into the main hall, and went through one of the doors on the left. As we entered on the other side, we saw a backdrop, several reflectors, a camera, a chair, some props, and as I leaned in to look at the side, I saw a wardrobe filled with black, red, purple, and white clothes, though the individual pieces were hard to make out.

"What is this place…?" I wondered aloud.

"Looks like the room's intended for Airou," Delawyn replied.

"Yeah, looks like it. Uh, you don't think he's… y'know," Hisoka said, making a vague gesture with his hands.

"The mastermind? Possibly, but I don't think this room's proof of that," Delawyn said.

"Then what is this place?" I asked.

As if on cue, Monokuma appeared in front of us again.

"That's easy!" He said, rubbing his hands on his stomach. "I thought you kids would get bored easily, so I changed up some of the treatment chambers to be places to foster your little talents and have fun with each other!"

"… So we have entertainment facilities, but not a basic first aid room," Delawyn said.

"Yep! For now, anyway. Since new locations are gonna open up every time you finish a class trial…" Monokuma said.

"Hey, we're not going to do something so horrible a second time! Not after what we saw happen to Kinzo!" I said. "Nobody would do something like that again!"

"Upupupu… You'd be surprised by the amount of evidence that proves you wrong," Monokuma said, chuckling. "Well, I've got 11 other bozos I need to supervise, and I'm only one bear! Ciao!"

And just like that, he disappeared.

"What would he know?" Hisoka clenched his fists. Delawyn and I exchanged glances.

"Well, I can't see anything of much use. Let's go investigate the next door over," Delawyn said, turning around and heading out of the door, with Hisoka and I following her out.

We headed into the next room over…

… and I could've screamed for what I saw.

Inside was a torture chamber. An honest to god, torture chamber. It was the only place in the asylum that hadn't had wallpaper or flooring put up – it was all concrete, with torture chairs and devices drilled into the floor. An interrogation chair, a waterboarding table, so many horrific tools…

Dai, Kadiri, and Airou stood inside as well.

"T-The fuck is this?!" I heard Hisoka stumble backwards, and grabbed onto his wrist subconsciously.

"Yes, of course. No basic medical facility, but a _torture chamber_ is no problem for Monokuma," Delawyn said, and as I looked beside me, I could see a subtle scowl on her face.

"He wishes for us to kill each other. I doubt he'd go to the trouble of removing a torture chamber," Airou said.

"Kill each other, not torture," I said.

"Killing's a lot easier than torture," Airou said.

"Do you ever shut up about horrific shit?" Hisoka said.

"He's got a point this time, though," Dai said. "Still, this room's rather horrific."

"Why are we even still here?" Kadiri asked. "We found labs for Airou and Korin. I would like to find my lab."

"There weren't 16 doors, so it's entirely possible yours is up the stairs. Or even doesn't exist," Airou said.

"Whatever, doesn't hurt to check them, right, you Vlad Tepes wannabe?" Kadiri retorted.

Airou was silent for a moment, his face void of expression, before smiling. "Of course it doesn't hurt, Kadiri."

"Then let us be off," Dai said. The three of them then walked around us and out of the room.

"… Really not too keen on spending much more time in here," Hisoka said.

"I wonder if there's a way to lock this from the inside and prevent entry…" Delawyn said. I quickly walked over to the door, investigating it for anything of the sort…

"… There's no lock on this door." I turned back to Hisoka and Delawyn.

"Of course, there's no fuckin' lock," Hisoka groaned.

"Then we may be able to fashion a wedge of some kind to prevent entry. All I know is, I don't want people coming in here," Delawyn said.

"I didn't expect this kind of caution about death from an assassin…" Hisoka admitted.

"Killing each other here, for Monokuma's entertainment, is pointless," Delawyn replied. "We'd be giving him what he wants."

"That's understandable. Maybe we'll find something we can use to block this off in another room!" I said.

"Right. We should go find that something, if we can," Delawyn said. "For now, let's keep exploring."

"Right," I said, before heading out of the room. Hisoka followed closely behind me, and Delawyn gave a little more space.

We went to the other room directly next to the torture chamber. As we walked in, we found green walls and wooden flooring, a mirror and circular platform, a rack full of fabrics, a drafting desk, a sewing machine, and near the mirror and platform, a sewing kit.

Korin, Satoko, and Kokuro also stood inside.

"I don't need a bloody makeover! I'm fine as-is!" Kokuro said, indicating that we just walked in on an argument between Korin and her.

Satoko gently grabbed Korin's sleeve, before gesturing towards us. Korin's eyes soon fell to us, with Kokuro also glancing over.

"Ah, my apologies for that," Korin said.

"Yeah, you're not sorry at all," Kokuro replied.

"This must be your lab, right, Korin?" Hisoka asked.

"Yes, I believe so," Korin said, twirling a pencil between his fingers. "It's certainly an upgrade from where I'm used to be working. The textiles are all of a nice quality, and that's not even keeping in mind we've been kidnapped."

"It does appear rather sophisticated for a fashion designer," Hisoka says.

"If you wanted, Hisoka, I could take your measurements and create something for you," Korin said.

"Uh… doesn't that usually involve getting into my underwear?" Hisoka asked.

"Well, that provides the most accurate measurements," Korin said.

"Yeah, uh, thanks, but no thanks." Hisoka shook his hands dismissively with an embarrassed smile.

"Very well. The offer's always open if you change your mind," Korin smiled.

"Er… maybe I could take my own measurements and give them to you?" Hisoka offered.

"That… would also work," Korin replied.

"Can't you pursue your awful taste in guys in your own time?" Kokuro folded her arms.

I caught Satoko's eyes narrowing at Kokuro, though she still said nothing.

"This is our own time, but perhaps it is time to move on," Korin agreed.

"Then let's go already," Kokuro said, turning around, and heading back out into the hallway. Korin and Satoko followed.

After the three left, Delawyn walked over to the fabric racks, looking through the ones available.

"What are you doing? You're gonna make Korin mad!" I protested, heading over.

"I'm fairly certain Korin will understand if I'm looking for some cloth to wedge under the door to a torture chamber," Delawyn said, before pulling out about a metre of brown fabric.

"… I'll catch up with you later," Delawyn said. "Go explore some of the other places."

"Doesn't that defeat the concept of staying together? What if someone tries to-" I stopped myself. No… No, nobody will try it again.

"Do you really think someone's going to try me? My talent is the Ultimate Assassin, after all," Delawyn said.

"True… Okay, we'll meet up with you later," Hisoka said.

"Okay…" I said. Hisoka walked out of the room, and I followed him.

We decided to walk to the room across from Korin's lab. As we approached, I could smell something nice inside… as well as the vague sense of something burning.

I pushed open the door, and I wasn't surprised by what I saw. Inside, I saw what looked like the inside of a small café, complete with small booths, some tables, a window with a digital display of a rainy day, and even a counter with many treats inside. Hiroshi was arranging the flowers and plants at the tables.

I took a few more steps inside, and saw the source of both the pleasant and burning smells – Tae was operating a coffee machine, while Aeko was blowing smoke off a tray of burned-black cupcakes.

"I told you that you can't set the oven to 800 degrees for a 5-minute cook time!" Tae called back as Aeko placed the cupcakes on the counter.

"Alright, you were right, Tae!" Aeko said, giggling, waving her hand in front of her face as smoke rose to meet it.

"You're getting along well, huh?" Hisoka said, a smile on his face.

"Yep!" Tae said, before pouring the coffee from the machine into three tall milkshake glasses. As she put it back, she pushed her fingers together. "… I might have let Aeko make the cupcakes like that to teach her why we don't cook things on such a high temperature…"

"I didn't burn myself, and that's what's important!" Aeko said proudly, switching the oven off.

"I… well, yes, it's important, but so is producing something edible," Tae said, laughing nervously. "Oh! Maemi, Hisoka, while you're here, do you want any coffee?"

"Oh- no thanks, I'm fine after breakfast…" I said, smiling, and waving my hands dismissively.

"Yeah, I'm good too. Thanks for offerin', though," Hisoka said.

"Okay… I don't see any rules about not being able to take food with you, so maybe the three of us could explore with these?" Tae said, placing the coffees on the counter.

"We should probably do that, actually… You think Delawyn or Airou's more likely to have our hides if we just sat in here the whole time?" Hiroshi asked.

"Delawyn's not bad," I said, almost instinctively, and I took a breath as I anticipated a negative response.

"… Yeah, you're right, Maemi," Aeko said, taking one of the coffees.

"Wish I could say the same for Airou, but…" Tae trailed off. "Anyway, that room on end of the left side of the hallway?"

"Sure!" Aeko and Hiroshi both said in unison.

The three filed out, coffee in hand. Desperate to get out of the smoke from the cupcakes, Hisoka and I followed them out as well.

We entered the room next door afterwards. Along the back wall, decorated in brown wallpaper, was a rack full of tools – hammers, carving picks, brushes, and several other tools, most of which I had no idea what they were for. To the left were several disks of various sizes along the floor, and a pair of stools were strewn around. I glanced to my right and saw a small storage room, and a kiln. I also saw Kokuro, Korin, and Satoko again, with Satoko carrying a bag of white clay in her arms.

"So… this must be Satoko's lab, right?" Hisoka asked.

"Right," Korin replied.

"Ugh. I'm gonna go wait outside," Kokuro said, shoving past us.

"… What got into her?" I asked.

"Nothing, Maemi, she's been acting that way since we arrived here," Korin said.

"Fair enough," I said. "What are you thinking of making, Satoko?"

Satoko's eyes lit up, before sinking towards the floor. I think I heard the slightest sound of a syllable coming out of her mouth, but she placed the bag on one of the tables and started mimicking something… She curled her hands out in front of her, before cupping them at the top of her head.

"… A cat?" I said, after a few moments.

Satoko nodded, her eyes back on me.

"Aw, how cute!" I said. "Can you show me when you're done?"

Satoko looked at me weakly, before nodding slowly.

"Okay, thank you!" I said.

"I'll ask Satoko to come out when we meet back up, but I think for now the rest of us should keep exploring," Korin said.

"Bring up a good point. Haven't seen some of the other rooms yet, though I think we're over halfway done by now," Hisoka said.

"Yeah, we should probably finish exploring the place," I admitted. "Maybe the room directly across?"

"I looked in there already," said Kokuro's voice from behind us as she came back through the door. "It's just a laundry room."

"So, that leaves the room at the end of the hallway, and the two rooms on either side," Hisoka said. "Wanna investigate the room at the end first?"

"Sure, then left to right from the way we came in?" I suggested.

"Sounds good. Wonder when Delawyn'll be back?" Hisoka wondered.

"I was curious about that," Korin admitted. "Did she just wander off?"

"Er, no… there's a torture chamber between your lab and Airou's, and she wanted to block off the door," I said.

"Torture chamber, huh…" Korin said, before shaking his head. "She is smart to block it off."

I leaned over to Hisoka and whispered, "Should we tell him it's with one of his fabrics?"

"He'll flip if we do," Hisoka whispered back, before standing straight and smiling. "Well, me and Maemi better be off. We'll catch you later."

"Very well," Korin said, and Hisoka left, grabbing my wrist, and pulling me along as well.

We walked to the room at the end of the hallway, Hisoka entering before me. The room seemed… oddly empty. There was a speaker on the wall and an outlined section of smooth wooden floor, but otherwise, no-

"Holy shit!" Hisoka exclaimed, and I glanced at him to see a giddy smile on his face.

"I… I'm guessing this is your lab, Hisoka?" I asked.

"Couldn't be anybody else's!" Hisoka said.

"To be fair, your lab was given to you in a life-or-death situation by a murderous teddy bear," I said.

"I mean – sure, yeah, but don't ruin this for me! Or are you jealous that we haven't found yours yet?" Hisoka said, shooting me a shit-eating grin. I pouted in response.

"I only need a torch and a surface to put it on!" I protested, placing my hands on my hips. "Shadow puppeteering doesn't really need a sophisticated lab."

"I know, I know," Hisoka waved his hands dismissively. "… Well, I don't, but I trust your word on it, Maemi."

"Yeah… I'm still kind of self-conscious about it, though," I said, before shaking my head and changing the topic. "I don't think I've ever seen you perform live before!"

"Totally fair, I perform a lot but not everyone's got time to come to my performances, y'know?" Hisoka said. "Not right now, but maybe some time, I could perform for you?"

"Huh? Why not now?" I asked.

"I ain't got any routines choreographed right now and I can't remember them off the top of my head, but I can probably do one once I got that down," Hisoka replied. "Sorry about that."

"Oh, no, it's fine! I understand," I said, before smiling a little. "Well, I don't, but I trust your word on it, Hisoka."

Hisoka chuckled a little, and I couldn't help but do the same.

We remained silent for a minute, before Hisoka finally spoke up.

"You wanna investigate the last two rooms now?" He asked.

"Yeah, probably best," I said, turning towards the door.

"Alright, lead the way," Hisoka said, and I walked out the door, with him following behind.

As I said, I went towards the door that was now to our right. I'm not entirely sure what I expected on the other side, but it wasn't what I saw. I saw dartboards in one corner, a piano in the corner to our right, several bar tables and bar stools in front of us, some pool tables to our right in front of the piano, and a stage at the back of the room, with a red curtain as a backdrop.

I also saw Dai and Kadiri, and I could guess Airou probably wasn't far away. Surely.

"Er, where'd Airou go?" Hisoka asked.

"He's gone backstage, to confirm a theory of mine," Kadiri said.

"Theory?" I asked.

"Yes, I said such. Catch up, please," Kadiri said, causing me to pout again. "I came up with the idea that the curtain covers up a backstage area, so I sent Airou back to check."

"And she's correct," Airou's voice called out, as I watched the curtains part. "There is an elaborate backstage setup there. Ropes, sandbags, various unused props, you could host an entire show with them. Several, in fact."

"Interesting, now if only we could find a filming lab," Kadiri said.

"We've investigated everywhere else, Kadiri, I don't see your lab. Perhaps it's on the next level?" Dai suggested.

"Bah," Kadiri huffed, tossing her purple pigtails behind her head with a sway of her head.

"So, you guys know what's in that last room? What is it?" I asked.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. Best to investigate that on your own," Airou said, before chuckling.

"… Don't," Dai said.

"Er… well, I can't deny I'm curious," I admitted.

"Then go check for yourself," Kadiri said.

"Alright. If you're done, head back downstairs to the dining room, and if you meet any of the others, tell them to do the same. Hisoka and I will check that last room and join you there," I said.

"Don't tell me what to do." Kadiri folded her arms.

"She's actually got a good point, Kadiri," Dai said.

"Let's go for now," Airou said.

"Ugh. Fine," Kadiri said, and the five of us filed out of the games room.

I watched the other three head down the hallway, and I saw them tell Delawyn something as she was shoving something – likely, the cloth – under the crack in the door. I didn't hear what they were saying, but I saw Delawyn approach me and Hisoka instead. I didn't move, and neither did he.

"… I apologize for taking so long, but I think the chamber is appropriately shut," Delawyn said.

"That's good news," I replied. "We've just got one more room to investigate."

"That one," Hisoka said, gesturing to the room across from us.

"Then let's check it out," Delawyn said, taking the lead. "After that, Dai said we should meet in the dining hall."

"Yeah, I kind of sent her group up to do that since they'd already explored all the rooms," I said.

"Makes sense," Delawyn said, before opening the door.

On the other side, I could see a large bed with red blankets and pillows and pink sheets, with pink and red rose petals on the bed. Surrounding it was… uh. A lot of ropes, some handcuffs, and-

Delawyn shut the door almost as quickly as she'd opened it. Her eyes were squinted, and her lips were upturned.

"… **Why** ," She said, before sighing. "Let's go back to the others."

"… Yeah." I said, pretending to be unaware of the fact my cheeks were flushed. As I glanced at Hisoka, he looked away from me. I could only guess he was in the same situation.

We eventually reached the dining hall again, me desperately trying to think of anything I could to take my mind off what I'd just seen. Luckily, the others were there too – all 11 were already seated around the dining hall.

"Ah, finally, you've returned," Airou said. "Did you find that room interesting?"

I offered him nothing but a deep sigh and a shake of my head.

"Was it that room with the… uh…" Aeko pushed her fingers together, a furious flush of colour overcoming it.

"Most likely," I replied, shivering.

"What are you talking about?" Kenji asked.

"You… don't want to know." Hiroshi pushed his fingers together.

"Well, let's talk about the rest of the new locations. Kenji and I stayed on the bottom floor, and explored the new facility in the kitchen. There's a hallway with two changerooms on the left side, that rounds two corners and leads out to a swimming pool," Seiryo reported.

"And there's a balcony overlooking the pool," Tae added. "Uh- that's on the second floor."

"Yeah, that too," Kenji said.

"Some of us have also received rooms based on our talents," Airou said. "I believe myself, Korin, Tae, Satoko, and Hisoka have received those rooms."

"You two will be glad to know the tragic deaths of our friends got us a café," Kadiri said.

"Found a laundry room up there too," Kokuro said. "As for the first load, not it."

"I'll do it," Delawyn offered. "If you place your dirty washing at the front of your door by tomorrow morning, I'll have it done in 24 hours or so."

"Our ultimate labs also all have a lock on the door, though I did find a nasty-looking torture chamber with no lock on the door," Airou said.

"I've made sure nobody can enter, though," Delawyn interjected.

"And lastly… we found a recreational room. There's a stage, a backstage, several tables, some pool, some darts, and even a grand piano," Korin informed.

"So, hopefully, there's enough to make sure we're all having too much fun to commit murder!" I said.

"I wouldn't be too sure of that, Maemi," Airou said.

"God, will you just be quiet already?!" Aeko said.

"I'm just stating a fact," Airou replied. "We thought nobody would commit murder previously, only for Kinzo to snap and kill someone."

"Kinzo snapped under intense circumstances… but surely nobody else has something like a lover in a medical emergency," Hiroshi reasoned.

"Kinzo was far from the most depraved of us here. Essential point is, once again, it's no longer _if_ someone else will commit another murder. It's _when,_ " Airou said.

An uncomfortable silence hung around us after Airou's words. I didn't want to agree. And yet… No, I couldn't think like that! I'd just be giving in to what Monokuma and the mastermind want.

"Shut up! Nobody here is going to commit another murder!" I shouted, hands balling into fists.

"You said that last time, Maemi," Kadiri said. "First 'nobody's going to commit a murder', now 'nobody's going to commit another murder'. I think you should just accept murder is inevitable."

"B-But…" I stammered.

"Optimism is a virtue, Maemi. But blind optimism even when the universe is showing you that you're wrong… That's a burden on all of us," Dai said.

"Why must you all be like this?!" I shouted, feeling my breath starting to come out faster and sharper.

"If you want to live in an ideal world where you believe that Kinzo was the only one in this group capable of committing murder, be my guest, Maemi," Airou said. "But sooner or later, reality will come crashing back down on to you."

I didn't respond, and despite knowing I'd look like a drama queen, I left the dining hall before my anxiety got worse.

I didn't stop walking until I returned to my room, and threw myself onto my bed.

…

I lay there for a few minutes as my heartrate returned to normal. And then I lay there for a few more moments, just to be sure.

And then, finally, I rose back to my feet, wiped the sweat off my forehead, and decided that I couldn't just spend the whole day in my room… Or, at least, I _shouldn't_. I walked out the door, and decided to go find my classmates.

I went to the dining hall first, but I found it empty… I decided to head through the kitchen to the pool area, where I found Aeko.

"A pool's pretty nice! But I wish we had an aquarium… Without having to watch another one of our friends die, that is," Aeko mused to herself.

"Hey, Aeko, do you want to hang out?" I asked.

"Sure thing! Do you wanna take a swim together? It won't be like swimming in a fish tank, but it'll still be fun!" Aeko said.

I spent some time swimming with Aeko…

It seems me and Aeko got a little closer today.

"Oh, Aeko, I've been meaning to ask you," I began. "What's it like at your aquarium?"

Aeko's face lit up like I'd just given her a basket of newborn puppies.

"My aquarium's pretty new in Sappoko, and I'm competing with a few others already there – Sunpiazza, Otaru, Noboribetsu Marine Park. But I'm doing pretty well! A lot of the parks already there are fairly old, so a lot of people like that mine's up to date!" Aeko rattled off excitedly. "But there's still value in their aquariums, and I don't really care as long as I can stay open. The fish are all so cute!"

"Oh, cool! What's your favourite fish?" I asked.

Aeko pouted at me. "You don't ask a mother with twelve children which one her favourite is!"

"Right, right," I said, scratching the back of my head. "Um… how do you feel about the other aquariums?"

"Well, like I said, they're a little outdated, but as long as they take good care of the fish, it's all fine!" Aeko said. "If I have a day off, I like to visit them as a guest! The baby otters in Sunpiazza are so cute, and they've even swum to me and touched my hands!"

"Aaw!" I replied, smiling widely. "You must get around a lot."

"I try to, but I'm usually on-duty as the manager and owner of my aquarium…" Aeko replied. "So, I'm usually working there full-time. Sometimes, I'll even sleep there."

"Sleep?! Don't you have a house?" I asked.

"Well, yeah," Aeko replied, before pausing and mumbling, "… About five minutes' walk away…"

"I heard that," I replied.

"Don't you live near a shadow puppet theatre?" Aeko asked, and barely stifled a laugh.

"Shadow puppet theatre?" I replied.

"Yeah, like a place where you go and make shadow puppets for all the kids!" Aeko asked.

"Uh… I don't really do anything like that. There's not a huge demand for shadow puppeteering," I said.

"Oh… I see," Aeko said. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable…"

"It's fine. What else is there at your aquarium?" I asked.

"We let the guests feed the fish, though most aquariums have a system that does that," Aeko replied. "We have non-fish like polar bears we keep in arctic environments, penguins – we keep them in a separate Antarctic environment, of course – and we even have a baby seal rehabilitation program for orphans!"

"Your aquarium sounds amazing, Aeko!" I said.

"It is!" Aeko replied happily. "You should come sometime, if you can!"

Me and Aeko talked a little more, before we parted ways, and I was left to wander the asylum once more. I wound up wandering up the staircase, and eventually, wandered into Hisoka's lab. I wasn't surprised to find him in there, stretching as music played.

"Two, three, four, five…" Hisoka said under his breath, stretching his arms towards the ceiling.

"Hey, Hisoka, did you want to hang out for a while?" I said.

"Uwah- oh, Maemi! Didn't see you there. I still haven't choreographed anything, but maybe we could stretch together to the music?" Hisoka offered.

I spent some time stretching to music with Hisoka…

It seems me and Hisoka got a little closer today.

"Hisoka, I don't think I've gotten the chance to thank you yet," I said, scratching the back of my head.

"Huh? For what?" Hisoka asked.

"For being there since this whole thing started," I answered. "If I seemed like I was in a difficult spot, you never rested until I was okay again. Unless I needed my space, of course."

"I thought that was just the right thing to do," Hisoka replied. "Y'know, help cute girls in peril. Chivalry might be dead, but I'm not about to just kick a girl in the ass."

"Still, I'm really grateful you're here, Hisoka. If you weren't, I'm pretty sure I would've given up by now," I said.

"No prob!" Hisoka gave me a thumbs up.

A moment of silence passed between us, and though there was discomfort, it wasn't as bad as I'd predicted. Eventually, Hisoka spoke up again.

"So, what do you know about modern dance?" Hisoka asked.

"Not much… I'm assuming it means you specialise in contemporary dance," I replied.

"Kind of. The version I do incorporates gymnastics into dance routines," Hisoka said. "I lucked out in some ways, I guess. I got born with a pretty flexible body, which helps my movements."

And deciding to demonstrate, I watched Hisoka shoot his left leg up into the air, holding it perpendicular to his body.

"That's amazing!" I stammered out. "But doesn't that hurt?"

"Nah. We stretched already, and I told you, my body's pretty flexible," Hisoka replied, putting his leg back down. "That kind of flexibility and movement's helpful in dance routines."

"I imagine it would be," I replied. "What kind of routines do you usually do?"

"Generally, I set 'em to whatever dance tracks are popular in the clubs," Hisoka replied. "Though I did once try some more crazy experimental shit. Choreographed a modern club routine to an orchestral backing track. Wasn't as popular as my normal routines, but still got applauded for at least trying."

"It's good you still got applause. I can't imagine too many other dancers trying something like that," I replied. "Why didn't you keep pursuing it?"

"Eh. It got praise with critics, but since it didn't do as popular with my target audience, I decided to try it again later," Hisoka said.

I giggled a little. "Let me guess, your target audience is-"

"Girls," we both said at the same time.

"Yep, mostly ones my own age. Don't get me wrong, I like any attention, but I'm a teenage straight guy," Hisoka said.

"So naturally, you enjoy the attention that teenage girls give you the most," I said.

"Yeah, pretty much," Hisoka replied. "I know, sounds shallow. The hot guy cares about impressing girls. But I can't exactly help it."

"I know, I know," I said. "I don't think you're shallow though, personally."

"Thanks, Maemi," Hisoka said. "It means a lot to me to hear you say that."

Hisoka and I did a few more stretches after our conversation, before I went back to my room.

The day finally faded to night…

I stayed in my room and decided not to go to dinner. I wasn't exactly hungry, anyway. Though I'd relaxed some, my mind was still on the meeting…

I laid back, staring at the ceiling. Part of me contemplated getting a drink from my sink tap. Part of me contemplated reading more of the book to myself. Part of me contemplated going and getting at least something to eat. Yet I stayed put.

In the end, what got me out of bed was the sound of my doorbell ringing. I threw myself to my feet, walked over to the door, and opened it. Delawyn and Hisoka stood outside.

"Hey!" I greeted, smiling.

"Hey, Maemi!" Hisoka said. Delawyn invited herself into my room, and Hisoka decided to follow her in. I closed the door behind the three of us.

Delawyn sat down on the floor, crossing her legs. "So, where's this book you were telling me about?"

"Right, right. I'll get it," I said, before ducking under my bed. Luckily, it hadn't been moved, and it was the only thing underneath my bed. I pulled it out and sat down beside her, planting the book on one of each of our thighs. Hisoka pulled up a chair behind us, reading over our shoulder.

We read the passages I had the previous night – about the Tragedy, the killing game of Class 78, and about Makoto Naegi and Junko Enoshima. And then, we read further.

 _Though none can agree on an official date for the "end" of the Tragedy, most agree that the end of the Tragedy was during 2016, around eight years after it begun. Hope's Peak Academy was restored in early 2017 and began scouting students just before the 2017 school year began, and precautions were made to prevent a similar event from originating from it ever again._

"And we're the 2019 class, I think… Class 81, if my math's right and they had Class 79 in 2017," Hisoka said.

"… I doubt that not warning students of the tragedy would help us prevent it from happening again," Delawyn said.

"So… what do you think happened, then?" I asked.

"… I have a few theories. One is my doubt is somehow correct – they never told us about the tragedy. That despite it happening throughout most of our childhoods, we somehow missed the entire thing," Delawyn replied.

"That doesn't sound likely. What're your other ideas?" Hisoka asked.

"The most likely at this point is some form of amnesia. If this book is trustworthy, then there's a good chance we've all been brainwashed into forgetting the Tragedy," Delawyn said. "I think that's the most likely thing."

"Are there any other theories…?" I asked.

"If you have any, I'm willing to listen to them," Delawyn said. "How could we all simply forget about the so-called end of the world?"

"Well, it's a huge stretch, but maybe we were traumatised by it and our brains just kind of erased it?" I suggested.

"If you can't think of other theories, it's nothing to be ashamed of. But don't spout nonsense," Delawyn said.

"Okay, okay, I can't think of anything else," I admitted.

"So you think the mastermind took our memories?" Hisoka asked.

"That makes the most sense. The mastermind steals our memories of the tragedy, replaces them with happy memories of the last eight years, then locks us in here none the wiser," Delawyn said.

"Should we look through it more?" I asked.

"Probably a good idea," Hisoka said, pointing back to the book. But as I turned another page…

"… It's…" I said, stammering.

"… Monokuma must've _wanted_ us to know we lost our memories of the Tragedy, if he left that in," Delawyn began, before gesturing at the ink-black pages in front of us. "But destroyed the rest of the book."

"Damnit! And I thought we were finally gettin' an upper hand on that black-and-white shit," Hisoka said, shaking his head.

"If our captor can take our memories away and replace them, then we can't underestimate them under any circumstances," Delawyn said, getting to her feet. "Our lives could depend on that."

"Wait, you're leaving already?" I asked.

"Do you have anything else you want to discuss?" Delawyn replied. "If you do, I'll hear it out.

I shut my mouth – I'm not entirely sure why I asked in the first place. She looked at the book, and the three of us put together an explanation.

"… Then I'll be going. You can stay if you want, Hisoka," Delawyn said, as she left my room, shutting the door behind her.

I opened my mouth to speak again, when the monitor in my room turned on.

"Attention all lunatics: it is now 10pm," Monokuma began. "It is now officially nighttime. The doors to the cafeteria and dining hall will lock shortly. Please, all of you have pleasant dreams, and we'll see each other tomorrow morning!" The monitors shut off.

I bit my tongue as I had a sudden realisation, not wanting to blurt it out and alert Hisoka.

"Um… do you want to stay?" I asked.

"I… Well, yeah, of course I do, but I probably shouldn't," Hisoka replied. "I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

"Yeah, okay. See you tomorrow!" I said, watching as Hisoka left the room.

As the door shut, I threw myself onto my bed and started screaming at my incompetence and forgetfulness. Less than 24 hours ago, Monokuma told me the monitors could pick up everything we said… There was no way he didn't know that I'd talked to Hisoka and Delawyn. That we knew about The Tragedy.

Though he hadn't killed any of us, so I couldn't imagine anything he'd do with that information.

I lay back and found sleep overtaking me.

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

"The standard deck of playing cards is so strange."

"You've got King, Queen, and Jack, for 4 suits, and titles like the Queen of Hearts and King of Diamonds sound epic."

"But then you suddenly switch to numbers! Ten of spades, five of clubs. And they don't sound very good as titles."  
"You get to the final card in a stack, and they change again! Ace of Diamonds!"

"Then you find a Draw 4, and your opponent throws the table across the room."

"So, how many cards can you connect? Can you connect four in a row?"

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

…

…

"Ahem- attention, all lunatics! It is now 7am! The cafeteria and dining hall have been unlocked," Monokuma announced. "Please, let's all have a wonderful day together!" The monitors shut off as Monokuma finished his morning announcement.

I woke up to find yesterday's clothes still on me and my hair in a slight mess.

Right… I forgot to get into my pyjamas and take my hair out before sleeping last night.

I took a brief shower, brushed my hair, put it in its twintails, put my clothes on, and headed out towards the dining hall.

As I walked in, I found Dai, Seiryo, and Hiroshi already there, and the smell coming from the kitchen indicated Tae was awake as well.

"Good morning!" I greeted, waving.

"Good morning, Maemi," Dai said, as I took a seat next to her.

I sat in relative silence, as our other classmates made their way in. Delawyn and Hisoka arrived at the same time, as did Korin and Satoko. Kokuro, Kadiri, Aeko, Kenji, and Airou all entered the hall at their own pace, sitting in various places around the dining hall.

Eventually, Tae came out of the kitchen, with various dishes stacked along her arms.

"I'll be back with the coffee in just a second!" Tae said, as she placed the plates on the table and went back into the kitchen.

But as soon as the kitchen door shut behind Tae…

"Did you miss me?" A voice called out, and I let out an audible groan as Monokuma appeared on the table in front of us.

"Again? Go away already," Kokuro said, before sighing.

"Aw, I come all this way to give you guys another present, and this is how I'm greeted? My fluffy little white heart can't take it! It's gonna burst right out my chest!" Monokuma said.

"Present?" Dai asked.

"Yep, yep! I have a little secret to tell you all," Monokuma said. "But, you gotta promise not to tell anybody else but Tae! Zip, zip, ravioli! Only tell the coffee loli!"

"Tae's not a loli! She's short, but that doesn't make her a loli!" Aeko stood up.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. Let me have a little fun, won't ya?" Monokuma said. "Aaaanyway, onto the present!"

"Do we have to?" Hiroshi sunk in his chair.

"Well, considering it's your next **motive,** I'd recommend it! It's got the Monokuma Seal of Approval!" Monokuma said.

"M-Motive…?" I stammered.

"Bingo, Maemi! And thank yourself and that little get-together you had with Delawyn and Hisoka for it!" Monokuma replied.

I watched Delawyn's gaze latch onto Monokuma, and I saw no kindness in those green eyes.

"We don't want any motive of yours," Kokuro folded her arms. "Fuck off."

"You circus freaks these days are so mean… Oh well. I'm gonna tell you anyway!" Monokuma said. "You guys have all lost several important memories!"

"Shut up!" Hisoka rose to his feet, reaching out towards Monokuma.

"Are you thinking of harming me, Hisoka?" I could see a sinister glow in Monokuma's eye as he said this, and I felt my anxiety well in my gut.

"H-Hisoka, sit down! Please!" I called out.

"I've had it up to here with your shit, Monokuma!" Hisoka made to grab Monokuma…

…

… and stopped his hand less than ten centimetres away.

In an instant, both Mononurses had a bone saw against his neck, and I could see the slightest trickles of blood.

"Hisoka!" I called out, getting out of my seat as well.

"I'll repeat myself, Hisoka. Are you thinking of harming me?" Monokuma asked.

Hisoka's hand hovered in the air for a moment, before finally retracting and returning to his side. As he returned his hand, the Mononurses lowered their bone saws and left through the dining room door.

"Be thankful Maemi knows how to keep you on a leash," Monokuma said, and I gritted my teeth.

"I'm not keeping Hisoka on any leash! I just…" I began, as Hisoka sunk back into his seat and began wiping the blood off his neck.

"I'm ba- What happened?!" Tae asked, several trays stacked with coffee cups in both of her arms.

"Oh, lookie here! I don't even have to go tell you privately or rely on these kids to tell you!" Monokuma said. "Now, as I was saying, you've all lost several important memories!"

"That doesn't sound quite right," Seiryo said. "We've all lost our memory? That's highly unlikely."

"The true voice of a kid who's forgotten he has amnesia!" Monokuma said. "Not only have you lost memories of the last ten years, you've forgotten about your school life together too!"

"The… what are you-?" I stammered out.

"I'm saying, alongside the Tragedy of Hope's Peak and the Most Despair-Inducing Incident in the History of Mankind, you've completely lost memories of your time together as classmates and friends!" Monokuma announced. "Such a shame to see you all just forget about it all..."

"A shame? You took those memories from us," Delawyn said.

"Tut-tut-tut, let's not get into all those nitpicky details," Monokuma replied. "I'm a beary generous little rascal, and I'm willing to restore the memories of whoever passes the next class trial, whether the culprit, or the innocents! So, have fun with your new motive, everybody!"

Monokuma then disappeared, leaving us with more questions than answers.

"Tragedy, Despair-inducing incident… What does it all mean?" Dai mused to herself.

"Monokuma mentioned you three when he talked about the motive," Kadiri said, pointing to me, Delawyn, and Hisoka. "So, explain. What does he mean?"

"The Tragedy… it was an event at Hope's Peak Academy way back in 2009. Hope's Peak shut down over it. The entire reserve course committed suicide. And after that, well… the world ended, to put it bluntly," I said.

"E-Ended? But how are we-" Tae began.

"The world didn't technically end and wipe humanity out, but we fell into a state of worldwide anarchy," Delawyn said.

"Right, that was the Most Despair Inducing Incident in the History of Mankind," I added.

"Interesting. And our memories as classmates?" Kadiri asked.

"I… I don't know," I admitted. "I found a book in the library detailing the Tragedy, but when it seemed like there was more, the whole thing was just blacked out."

"So, none of us have memories of us together as classmates… Interesting," Kadiri said.

"I guarantee I'm happier that way," Kokuro said.

"Can't relate," Korin added.

"Nobody asked you," Kokuro muttered.

"Let him speak anyway!" Aeko said.

"U-Um!" Tae called out, before tapping a mug with her spoon.

In a moment, all of our eyes were on her, as she pulled out one of the chairs and stood on it.

"We might not have memories together as classmates, but maybe we could make new ones?" Tae offered.

"What does that mean?" Kenji asked.

"What I mean is, uh… there's that recreational room on the second floor, right? We could have a class party in there!"

"A class party?" Airou repeated.

"Yeah, I could make sweets for everyone, and – ooh! We could break out the casino props, Kadiri, Maemi, Hisoka, and Kokuro could perform, Korin could make nice costumes for everyone-"

"Slow down there, Tae. We haven't agreed to this yet," Dai said.

"Seems like a lot of unnecessary crap for one possibly fun memory…" Kenji lamented.

"Look… I know that we're all sceptical right now. I don't want to force you to do this, but… I think it would be beneficial for all of us. It would show we don't need Monokuma's dumb motives. We can just make new memories with each other!" Tae said. "But… I won't force you to do so if you don't want to. I just thought that it might be good for us…"

"I'll do it," Hisoka said.

"Hisoka?" Tae asked.

"I can't make a routine for performing by tonight, but I think I could have one done by tomorrow night," Hisoka replied.

"If you gave me your measurements, I could come up with a costume that complements you well… as well as some nice clothes for every other participant, of course," Korin said.

"I'd be glad to go!" Hiroshi said.

"As would I," Seiryo said. "I might as well."

"Ooh, we could be hostesses of the party together, Tae!" Aeko said, with a beaming smile on her face.

"I'll come too!" I said. "I'm not sure if shadow puppeteering will be a worthwhile performance on that kind of stage, though."

"I've got lights in my lab that you can borrow if you'd like to perform. But, colour me intrigued by the party," Airou said.

"You're not planning to hijack it by talking about sad stuff, are you?" Aeko said, giving Airou an incredulous glance.

"Oh, no. Absolutely not." Airou looked offended that he'd even been asked. "Is it too much to believe I might want to reconcile with Tae?"

"I… well, the more, the merrier," Tae replied.

Aeko blinked, before shrugging. "… Okay, if you're fine with it."

Something caught my eye in the corner of the room near Korin – I saw Satoko raising her hand slightly.

"Oh, did you want to join in too, Satoko?" I asked, to which Satoko slowly nodded her head.

"I suppose I'm interested, though I'll admit I am not the best when it comes to parties," Dai said.

"Have you seen the stage? There's no way my acrobatic routines would fit in such a small space. But… Ugh. Whatever, I guess I'll join the party. Peer pressure and all that crap," Kokuro said.

"Well, my actress talents would be more than wonderful for the stage, but it takes more than one performer to make a show. So, I will permit one of you to give a subpar performance alongside mine," Kadiri said.

"Alright, we're getting it together! Delawyn, Kenji, what about you?" I asked.

"I can't even get up the stairs… not with my wheelchair, anyway," Kenji replied.

"If I carried it up and down, would you join us?" Seiryo offered.

"… I dunno," Kenji replied.

"You don't have to join us, but we'd really appreciate it if you came with!" I said.

"… Fine, then," Kenji said.

"Alright!" I exclaimed. "Okay, Delawyn, what abou-"

Delawyn's gaze on me cut deep.

" **How did Monokuma know of our meeting, and what we learned?** " She asked.

"I-I don't know!" I stammered.

"You do. Don't lie," Delawyn said.

"Calm down, both of you," Seiryo said. "Maemi, I think it's best you explain to all of us."

"O-Okay… um. When I woke up last night to go to the library, Monokuma came up to me… I'd told someone else something, and he knew. When I asked how he knew… well, apparently every monitor in the asylum has a microphone," I explained. "And they can pick up all our conversations."

"That was the night just after Kinzo's trial, right?" Delawyn asked, and her gaze hadn't gotten any less intense.

"Y… Yes?" I stuttered.

"… So, you knew the monitors recorded our conversations, and you _still_ held a conversation in your room, near one of the monitors," Delawyn said.

"I- I swear, I forgot! I forgot the monitors recorded conversations!" I held my hands up defensively, backing away.

Delawyn's gaze continued to pierce me, and I worried I would find one of the knives from the food at my throat in the next few seconds. But, Delawyn took a deep breath, and closed her eyes.

"… I've explored all over the asylum. There aren't any rooms without monitors. It's not like we could've done anything even if you did remember," Delawyn said. "… I apologise for holding things up. I'll join in on the party as well and make sure nothing goes wrong during it."

"Then we're all in it together!" Tae said. "I'll start work in the afternoon!"

"Why do you get to slack off for half a day?" Kokuro asked.

"It's not slacking off, it just ensures that the cupcakes and food I'm going to make is fresher!" Tae replied.

"Well, I can't exactly slack off, if I'm going to be designing and making 14 costumes," Korin said, getting out of his chair. "If you need me, I'll be in my lab, but I doubt I'll be able to help."

"I should probably go choreograph, too…" Hisoka said.

"Hm… Dai, how you join me for my performance?" Kadiri said.

"… I suppose I can do that," Dai replied.

One by one, we all left the table. Some of us went upstairs to prepare for the party, while others of us stayed downstairs.

I didn't really know what kind of shadow puppet show I could put on for the others, and I had no access to background tools… so I decided to just wander around the asylum for the time being. I found myself walking upstairs, and into Tae's lab, where I found her making a cup of coffee.

"I hope that everyone'll be able to get along at the party…" Tae mused to herself.

"Hey, Tae, want to hang out for a while?" I asked.

"Oh, good morning, Maemi! I'd be glad to. Do you want a coffee as well?" Tae replied.

I spent some time making and drinking coffee with Tae…

I think Tae and I got a little closer today.

"Maemi, do you have a preferred flavour of coffee?" Tae asked.

"Er- not really, I just kind of drink it when needed…" I replied. "I definitely think yours tastes wonderful, though."

"Okay… uh, what about tea? Any preferred flavour?" Tae asked.

"Um… I guess green tea is really nice, but I prefer it sweetened," I replied.

"Okay, what about breakfast foods? Anything you really like?" Tae asked.

"Um… well, I don't have any allergies, so I'm good with most things…" I said. "Why are you asking so many questions, Tae?"

"I want to be able to give you something you'll want for breakfast every morning," Tae replied. "I don't blame you for answering vaguely, but it does make things hard."

"Sorry… I just really don't have that many preferences for breakfast. I'll eat what's put in front of me if it's edible," I said.

"Okay… most people tend to like vanilla. It's a basic flavour, but it can make you feel nice and warm inside… And the fact vanilla is a pretty flower is nice, too," Tae said. "Then there's strawberry, which is nice for a punch of energy… well, if it's from real strawberries. If it's artificial, then it doesn't help much at all, but tastes really sweet."

"I see…" I said, though I wasn't really all that sure of what Tae was talking about.

"Yeah, and salted caramel is a pretty popular flavour too. It's nice and creamy, but sweet like toffee, y'know? A less popular flavour is matcha, as generally it's seen as a spicy drink, but I personally think it's nice," Tae said.

"Uh, yeah…" I replied.

"Ah… I'm sorry, my rambling's probably not making much sense, is it?" Tae asked.

"No, not really," I said. "Sorry… I don't know that much about coffee or café jobs or anything like that."

"Oh, it's okay. That's understandable," Tae replied. "Hm… is there anything you want to try?"

"Er… I'm not sure," I admitted. "Do you have any recommendations?"

"Well… you look like you'd enjoy strawberry flavours of both artificial and natural varieties, so how about I fix one of each?" Tae suggested.

"Uh… sure?" I said.

"Okay! I have some more recipes I need to look into, so next time we hang out, I could whip those up for you?" Tae said.

"Sure thing!" I replied.

"Then it's settled!" Tae gave a smile that was like looking into a kennel of puppies…

I talked a little more about breakfast foods with Tae, before heading back to my room…

There was still some time left in the day, however, so after a few moments lying down on my bed, I began exploring the asylum once more. I eventually encountered Kadiri in the recreational room, on the stage.

"You admire it… I admire its purity. A survivor... unclouded by conscience, remorse, or delusions of morality," Kadiri recited.

"Uh… hey, Kadiri, do you want to hang out?" I asked.

"Oh, how excellent, a supporting role! Come, assist me with this scene so I don't have to act it all myself."

I spent some time learning and helping Kadiri with her performance…

It seems me and Kadiri got a little closer today.

"Maemi, have you ever acted before?" Kadiri asked.

"Er… I played a tree in a junior high play once, does that count?" I replied, with a nervous chuckle.

"Well… I suppose even dirty, bloodied, disease-infested water is still water," Kadiri replied. "It cannot compare to pure, filtered water, though."

"Right… well, my talent isn't acting," I replied.

"Of course not. It's cute, but it's far from an entertaining great. Of course, I have an impressive lineup under my name," Kadiri said.

"I know! Painter's Dream, Midsummer Melancholy, The Oasis of Ice…" I said.

"… Blue Lips in Tokyo, The Last Empress – did you hear, they changed the lead from a male to a woman just so I could play that role?" Kadiri asked.

"Wait, seriously? I knew that film companies in the west had a habit of changing the gender of a role, but here, too?" I said.

"Yes, though not to make a statement. Simply so that their best talent was front and centre," Kadiri said. "The Coffee Shop on Kyogate Street, Firework, and that's barely scratching the surface of what I've done."

"I heard you already had a massive film lineup…" I said.

"Yes. Almost eighty movies in three years, and many of them hits. I'm quite amazing, aren't I?" Kadiri asked, reaching into her pocket.

"Yeah, that's phenomenal!" I said.

"Ah, right, the 2019 remake of Phenomena… That was my next project before this whole situation happened," Kadiri said, before pulling out a cigarette and a lighter.

"Um… are you allowed to smoke?" I asked.

"Doesn't say in the rulebook I can't," Kadiri said, sticking the cigarette in her mouth and lighting the end. She took a puff, before turning back to me. "Don't know what I'll do after I run out of them, though. Do you think Monokuma will give me more if I ask?"

"I… don't think I'm the best person to ask for that," I admitted, holding my hand over my nose. "Why do you smoke, anyway?"

"Mind your business, honestly," Kadiri retorted. "… Do you have a favourite film of mine?"

"Painter's Dream, definitely," I replied. "Though I also liked Shadow over the Sun, though why is probably a little obvious."

"Of course, my acting was phenomenal in those two films," Kadiri said.

"Well, yeah, that too, but I also liked how Shadow over the Sun utilized shadowy backdrops rather than an actual set," I admitted.

"I see…" Kadiri took another puff of her cigarette. "I suppose I should've seen that answer coming."

I helped Kadiri rehearse a little more, before I returned to my room once again…

As I entered my room, the monitors turned on.

"Attention all lunatics: it is now 10pm," Monokuma began. "It is now officially nighttime. The doors to the cafeteria and dining hall will lock shortly. Please, all of you have pleasant dreams, and we'll see each other tomorrow morning!" The monitors shut off.

I leaned back on my bed once I put my pyjamas on and took my hair out. I stared up at the ceiling, my mind on the party tomorrow. It'd be fun for all of us, right? We'd just have fun, and we'd be a class together, even if Kinzo and Mokichi weren't with us anymore…

Those thoughts stayed with me until I drifted off to sleep.

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

"Have you ever stuck your hand in a pot of warm honey?"

"It's nice, sticky, and gooey."

"It also makes a nice squelching noise. Squish, squish, squish."

"Warm honey also goes nicely in drinks as a substitute for sugar."

"Not for me, though. I prefer to lick it from the pot to the last drop."

"Sometimes I'll imagine I'm a bear eating someone's insides, instead of a bear eating nice, warm, sticky, honey."

"Oh, but I wouldn't recommend sticking your hand in a pot of boiling honey."

"You'll just lose your hand that way. My dear friend lost his hand, once…"

 **[MONOKUMA THEATRE]**

…

…

"Ahem- attention, all lunatics! It is now 7am! The cafeteria and dining hall have been unlocked," Monokuma announced. "Please, let's all have a wonderful day together!" The monitors shut off as Monokuma finished his morning announcement.

Once again, I found myself bleary-eyed as I woke up to that annoying excuse for an alarm clock, stretching my arms as I pushed myself out of bed. I took a shower, brushed my teeth, got dressed, put my hair up, and headed to the door.

As I was about to open it, I heard my doorbell ring. I opened the door to see Delawyn on the other side.

"Ah, good morning, Delawyn!" I said, with a smile. "I didn't think you'd wish me good morning, honestly…"

"Morning, Maemi," Delawyn replied. "Hisoka said I should apologise to you."

"Uh… is this for yesterday?" I asked.

"It is for yesterday, yes," Delawyn replied. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have been so harsh on you for that mistake. That said, we both need to be more careful in the future."

"Right. I'll keep that in mind," I said.

"Anyway, we should go to breakfast," Delawyn said.

"Yep, lead the way!" I said. Delawyn turned around and headed towards the dining hall, with me following behind her.

When we arrived at the dining hall, nearly everyone else was already there.

"I… didn't take that long getting ready this morning, right?" I asked.

"About the same amount of time as anyone else," Kenji replied. "… Tae and Aeko decided to make breakfast together, by the way, so just be weary of which food you take."

"I'm sure Aeko's cooking will be fine…" I said, taking a seat next to Hisoka.

"Famous last words," I heard Kokuro mumble.

After a moment, Tae came out with several plates balanced along her arms and head, while Aeko struggled with just the one large platter and with the door.

"Are you alright there, Aeko?" Hiroshi asked, pushing himself out of his seat.

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry! I got it under control!" Aeko said, as Tae slid the plates on her arms and head along the table.

"I'll be back with coffee momenta- uh, are you absolutely sure you don't need help, Aeko?" Tae asked. "I don't want a cute girl like you getting hurt…"

"It's fine, it's fine! I'm all good," Aeko said, placing the platter down in front of us. I couldn't deny that Tae's food looked more… edible.

Hisoka had more confidence in Aeko than I did. He took one of the brownies she'd placed on the table and took a bite eagerly.

I couldn't say that his transition from full confidence and friendliness to looking genuinely sick wasn't funny. But I also grew concerned, too…

"One… one second," Hisoka said, bowing his head apologetically, before running out of the room.

"I'll go after him. Make sure he's alright," Seiryo said, pushing himself out of his seat and following Hisoka out the door.

"… It's not that bad, is it?" Aeko asked. "I just wanted to help Tae with breakfast…"

"I'm sure it's fine!" Tae assured Aeko, taking a bite of one of the brownies she made… and her expression betrayed her, as Tae looked like she just stuck a live frog into her mouth.

"So… it is that bad…" Aeko lowered her head dejectedly.

"Uh… too much salt and cinnamon, not enough cocoa and sugar," Tae replied, placing the brownie back down. "It's cooked enough that it's nice and sticky, but not undercooked, though."

"Alright… I've always been better with fish, but I'm learning a lot from you!" Aeko said, and her face was uplifted into a broad smile.

"That's good. Um… as for the party tonight, I'll probably be in my lab all day making food. Do you think you could work on the decorations, too?" Tae asked.

"Sure thing! Hey, Hiroshi, do you wanna help out with the decorations?" Aeko asked. "We could make them together!"

"Huh? Oh, yeah!" Hiroshi said, clapping his hands together.

"Woo!" Aeko exclaimed, clapping her hands together.

"I drafted everybody's outfits yesterday," Korin said. "I have the materials I need, and will give them to you throughout the day."

"… Fine. I did practice a routine. But that stage is just so… small," Kokuro said, as Hisoka and Seiryo reentered the room.

"Are you alright, Hisoka?" I asked.

"Yeah, all good," Hisoka replied, giving me a thumbs-up.

"A little issue with the food. Likely, the taste and the excess of cinnamon had to do with it," Seiryo said.

"… Meaning what, exactly?" Kenji asked.

"Er… I threw up a bit. No sickness or shit like that, just didn't agree with me," Hisoka replied.

"Ew." Kadiri stuck a cigarette in her mouth.

"You probably shouldn't be smoking at all, let alone in front of us," Seiryo said.

"If you think I'm going to quit smoking, I recommend that you take those thoughts and place them someplace moist and magical," Kadiri said, standing up from her seat. "But I suppose I can take up your suggestion to go elsewhere. Dai, meet me in my room for more rehearsal on our performance. You sorely need it."

"I thought I was doing pretty well, myself…" Dai trailed off. "Alright, then."

Kadiri left the room, and I heard the clicking noise of her lighter as she left.

"I'll be in my lab if anybody needs me," Airou said, standing up and following suit.

"So I guess that's it for breakfast…" Tae said. "Oh well! The class party is today, so I guess that everyone's just eager to work hard for it!"

"Yeah, exactly. I'll get back to work on my routine! If I'm done before the party, I'll help set it up!" Hisoka said.

"I guess those who have nothing to do have the day to themselves?" Seiryo asked.

"Well, I can't force you to take a job, nor can I make you do one… So yes, feel free to just relax before the party!" Tae said.

The conversation continued for a little longer, before we all finally parted ways.

Even though I'd made up my mind to help Hisoka with setting up later, I still had a little time before the party…

I decided to wander around the asylum for a little bit, before running into Delawyn. I was pretty sure she had nothing to do…

She was silent as I approached…

"Er… Delawyn, do you wanna hang out?" I asked.

"… Sure. Be quiet, though. I'm thinking about _them,_ but I doubt they can hear my thoughts," Delawyn replied.

I spent some time sitting in silence with Delawyn as she thought about the mastermind… I think.

It seems me and Delawyn got a little closer today.

For a few moments, we sat in utter silence. Even though Delawyn's the Ultimate Assassin… I don't exactly feel that afraid around her. I'll even admit, I'm a little curious about her talent…

"… What's being a shadow puppeteer like?" She asked, finally breaking the silence.

"Oh, uh… Well, it's… not that interesting, actually," I replied. "Making some of the backdrops is fun, but most people don't pay attention to it as a performance medium…"

"I see," Delawyn replied. "Could you show me?"

"Uh… sure? Did you bring a light of some kind with you?" I asked.

Delawyn looked away, shaking her head. "Never mind, then. If you asked, you likely don't have one on you yourself."

"Ehe… yeah, that's true," I replied. "… Um… what's being an assassin like?"

"What's being an assassin like?" Delawyn repeated, and I slowly nodded. She lowered her head, before speaking.

"Assassination involves taking lives, that much is obvious. Lives that have deserved it, and lives that haven't. I'm not proud of my line of work, but…" Delawyn said.

"But…?" I said.

"… My parents wanted a secure future for me. That's all I'll say," Delawyn said.

"Even if your parents wanted a secure future for you, why-" I started, only to be cut off by a harsh glare.

"I said, that's all I'll say," Delawyn's eyes cut into me, and I decided to quickly change the subject.

"Um… what weapons are you usually using?" I asked.

"… Knives, daggers, and sniper rifles, usually. Depends on whether I can get close to the target without being seen or not," Delawyn said. "… You should see how many international politicians get the idea to throw lavish parties on the rooftops of buildings."

"You've-" I began, only to be cut off again.

"Killed international politicians? Yes. I think the highest profile target I ever succeeded in taking down was the president of the United States, but from what I saw, most people weren't that fond of him anyway." Delawyn replied.

"The president of the USA?" I exclaimed. "I- well, killing him is… it's amazing, but it's… um…"

"Terrible. It's amazing, but terrible," Delawyn said. "The things I do can be considered amazing, but in the end, it's professional murder."

"I…" I trailed off, not knowing what to say.

"… I understand why you're silent about this. Our talents are pretty far removed from each other," Delawyn replied.

"Yeah… your talent is amazing, and mine's not," I replied.

"Shadow puppeteering isn't a popular medium, but it brings a smile to the faces of those who see it. Assassination brings a smirk to the fact of the client and nothing else," Delawyn said.

We decided to change the topics to more middle-grounded ones, before we finally parted ways.

I decided it was time to go help Hisoka set up the recreational room for the party. I headed up the stairs, across the hall, and into the room – to find Hisoka had just entered as well.

"Hey, Hisoka!" I said, waving.

"Maemi? What are you doing here?" Hisoka asked.

"I don't have anything else to do, so I thought I'd come help you set up the party!" I replied.

"Oh! Sure thing!" Hisoka said. "Tae handed me these tablecloths before I left."

"Right, so… where should we put the candles while we put the cloths down?" I asked.

"Put them all on one table, then when we're nearly done, put them all back, put the one on the remaining table on another, put the cloth on, then put the candle back. Easy," Hisoka said, and he made it sound easy.

We spent the next ten minutes gathering the candles together and draping the tablecloths over the tables.

Aeko came in at about the five-minute mark and began placing decorations around the stage. We didn't say anything to each other, I just waved, and she waved back.

"See? Told you it'd be easy," Hisoka said, after we were finished.

"Yeah, but we don't have anything to do now…" I said.

"We could always fuck with the piano," Hisoka said. "Or play a round of darts or pool."

"I don't know how to play piano, so… maybe play pool together? That sounds like the less risky of the two games," I said.

"Hey, I don't know how to play either. I know you push the keys and notes come out. I dance to music, not make it," Hisoka said. "But if what you wanna do is play pool, then I'm happy to."

We spent the next couple of hours playing pool together…

Aeko came in again during our matches with more decorations and spent about five minutes putting them up, before heading back out again.

About ten minutes after Aeko left the second time, we heard a knock at the door. I put down my cue and walked to the door, noticing Hisoka knock one of the striped balls into the nearest hole with his hand.

I opened the door, and saw Korin standing on the other side.

"Ah, good afternoon, Maemi," Korin said. "I hope this is alright."

Korin held up a long, crimson mermaid dress with light pink sleeves. As I looked down, I found the dress had a gradient – crimson to black.

"That's- that's amazing! But how? I don't remember giving you any measurements…" I said.

"Monokuma gave me your measurements. In fact, the only one of you to give them to me yourself was Airou," Korin said.

"Oh, okay…" I said.

"And Hisoka, don't think for a moment I forgot you. I figured I'd give you your clothes together, since you seem to always be together," Korin said, and held out a dark blue tuxedo with a light blue tie and black shirt. There seemed to be black music motifs in the fabric of the tuxedo…

"Woah, nice! Thanks, man," Hisoka said.

"You're most welcome, Hisoka," Korin said. "I best be going back, to finish for everyone else."

"Yeah, and we should go get changed," I said. "I'll go get changed in the women's bathroom, okay, Hisoka?"

"Sure, and I'll go to the guys bathroom," Hisoka said, with a grin.

The two of us headed down the stairs together, before entering separate bathrooms on the first floor.

I spent a few minutes taking off my clothes and putting on the dress Korin gave me after locking myself in one of the stalls…

When I came out of the stall and saw myself in the mirrors…

… I didn't really recognise myself. The dress Korin made seemed to change how I looked almost entirely…

"… Is this really me?" I asked myself for a moment, before pinching the fleshy part of my thumb to be sure.

"Ow…" I said, before turning around slowly, looking at my reflection. "I… wow. I look amazing."

Korin was truly the Ultimate Fashion Designer…

I couldn't stand there and admire myself in the mirror for long, though. Hisoka was probably waiting for me…

I walked out of the bathroom and didn't find anybody standing there. I frowned, before heading over to the men's room. I figured Hisoka couldn't be that much further behind me…

"Hisoka? Are you alright in there?" I asked.

"Fuckin' thing won't tie!" I heard Hisoka's muffled voice call back.

"Won't tie? Are you talking about your bowtie?" I asked. "Let me come in and check it out!"

I opened the door to the men's bathroom, to see the tie done up fine. But Hisoka's hair was another story. His hands and arms were angled oddly, and his hairtie didn't seem to want to gather all of his hair.

"Hey, easy! You might rip your clothes!" I said.

"Fuckin' hell…" Hisoka muttered, as I walked over.

"Do you want me to do it up instead?" I asked.

"I think I just need to get the jacket off, but if you want to tie it up, I won't stop ya," Hisoka said.

I took the hairtie from him, and trying to memorise how it usually went up, I tied the hairtie at the back.

"There we go… All done!" I said.

As Hisoka turned around, I finally got a good look at him… He looked almost completely different, too. The suit looked really good on him…

"… We should probably go back to setting up for the party," Hisoka said after a few moments. "Before Monokuma or one of the guys catches you in the boys' bathroom, y'know?"

"Oh, right!" I said, quickly heading out of the bathroom, Hisoka behind me.

We went back to the recreational room and continued to play pool – a lot more difficult, in the clothes Korin gave us, but… being dressed up like this felt kind of nice. Like we were celebrities, almost. I guess Ultimates kind of are… but not in the same way. This felt like we were Hollywood celebrities… even though we were trapped in an abandoned mental asylum. It… was nice to forget that was the case.

At around 5:30, some of the other students began filing in. Aeko and Hiroshi walked in carrying trays of food – Aeko wearing a turquoise sequinned skater dress, and I could see some of the sequins were upturned and indigo underneath. Hiroshi wore a dark purple dress shirt and white pants, and I could see white cufflinks and purple thread on the shirt and pants respectively.

They were followed by Kokuro, Kadiri, Dai, and Seiryo. Kokuro quickly sat down at one of the tables away from everyone else, and I could see a white Lolita-style dress with black trims. Kadiri… really did look like a celebrity in her lilac ballgown, as she carefully took a seat next to Dai, who was dressed in a white sleeveless dress shirt, a sienna vest and pair of trousers, and a yellow bowtie. Seiryo sat down at the piano. He wore a fully-white suit, save for a dark blue dress shirt, and he'd tied his dreadlocks back.

"Do you even know how to play that thing?" Kokuro asked.

"A little. I'm not brilliant, but I am sufficient," Seiryo replied.

"Alright, but if I say stop, then stop," Kokuro huffed.

"Very well," Seiryo replied, and began to play the piano.

It… sounded nice. It wasn't Ultimate-level, so I didn't think Seiryo would be the Ultimate Pianist, but it was still nice to listen to.

"Wait, where's Kenji?" Hiroshi asked. "Didn't you say you'd help him, Seiryo?"

"F-!" Seiryo slammed the lid down on the piano, and I watched him bolt out of the room with uncharacteristic urgency and speed. As well as almost dropping the F-bomb in front of us…

The next three to enter were Airou, Korin, and Satoko. Satoko stuck close to her brother. Airou was dressed in a black suit with a crimson dress shirt, ponytail draped over his shoulder and a silver cross necklace in place of a tie of any kind. As much of an asshole as he was, I could see why he was called the Ultimate Model… and Korin probably had a blast designing what he was wearing. Korin was dressed in a pale green suit with a pale pink dress shirt underneath, and he'd also forgone a tie… though I saw nothing that replaced it. Satoko's clothes were fairly plain compared to everyone else, being a long-sleeved brown dress, but I figured she probably asked for that. She didn't seem like the type to go all-out.

After a few moments and as those three settled into the room, Seiryo returned with Kenji. Kenji wore a nice red dress shirt and white blazer with red thread, and a pair of red shorts that had been cuffed at the ends around his legs- well, lack thereof.

"Again, I'm really sorry for forgetting," Seiryo said.

"Eh. Don't worry about it. I wouldn't have minded if you forgot," Kenji said.

Kenji was wheeled to a table, and Seiryo decided to sit down with him this time. We were almost all here…

Delawyn was the next to enter the door, as Aeko got up onto the stage. I… couldn't help but feel a rush of blood to my cheeks. She wore a really beautiful olive-coloured dress, that complimented all her features nicely. She… she was beautiful.

"Ahem! Everybody's attention please!" Aeko said, smiling. "Tonight, me and Tae would like to welcome you… er… welcome you…" Aeko trailed off.

"Welcome us to what?" Kokuro rolled her eyes.

"N-No, it's not that, just… has anybody actually seen Tae?" Aeko said, looking around the room.

She… was right. There was an absence of sunny yellow in the room.

"Not since this morning," Dai said.

"I haven't seen her either…" Hiroshi said.

"I knocked on her lab's door earlier, but she didn't answer. I figured she was working on the food," Korin said.

"I went there a little while ago, but… I'll go check again!" Aeko said, before heading out the door.

"I'll go check the kitchen. Though she has her lab, I feel like that the kitchen's the next most likely place for her to be," Seiryo said, before also leaving.

"How about I check this room for her?" Airou offered.

"She's not here, you idiot! If she was, she'd have come out by now," Kokuro retorted.

"Perhaps she is playing a joke on us. I will check here anyway," Airou said, before crouching and glancing under the pool tables. He shook his head after obviously not finding her, before heading backstage to check there.

"… Maybe she went to her room and took a nap?" I suggested.

"Well, if you wish to go check there, I won't stop you," Kadiri said.

"I'll check with you, Maem-" Delawyn began, before she was cut off.

"Not to worry. I found her," Airou's voice sounded out from backstage.

Before I could open my mouth to say anything, at the same time, the door to the recreation room and the curtains to backstage opened.

"I didn't find Tae in her l…la… la…" Aeko stammered. I can only imagine how pale her face went…

… as my own eyes were locked on the hanging, dead body of the Ultimate Barista, Tae Kawada.


	7. Chapter 2 - Deadly Life

I couldn't take my eyes off Tae's hanging body.

Every word that was said back in the dining hall a few days ago came flooding back to me…

The blood drained from my face. Not only was I proven wrong, but… Tae, one of the sweetest and most kind girls I'd ever known, hung dead on the stage right in front of us.

I could hear Aeko's panicked cries turn to screams behind me. Part of me wanted to scream as well, but I found my voice caught in my throat.

The monitor in the recreational room turned on, and I heard a chime I begged to God would not become familiar to me.

"A body has been discovered! Following a brief period of investigation, we shall conduct our Class Trial!" The monitors said.

"What the _fuck,_ Airou?" Hisoka yelled, as Airou slipped out from behind the stage.

"What? You asked me to find Tae, and I found her," Airou replied, and I saw him bite his lip. "I must admit, I didn't expect to find her hanging dead backstage like a sandbag."

"How can you be so calm? Tae is…" Hiroshi exclaimed, knees trembling. "She's dead!"

"No… no! Don't say that!" Aeko threw the door shut and charged towards the stage, before having Dai's arms hook around her waist and hold her in place.

"Please, Aeko. I know how this must feel, but don't rush ahead like that," Dai said.

"Let go, please! She's not dead! Tae can't be dead!" Aeko pleaded.

The door opened once more behind us as Dai kept ahold of Aeko, revealing Monokuma and Seiryo on the other side.

"I… figured it would be this, but…" Though his skintone made it difficult to see, Seiryo's blood drained from his face.

"Aeko-Mako's got it all wrong!" Monokuma said. "The victim this time around is the one hanging right in front of you, the Ultimate Barista, Tae Kawada!"

"Please, I'll do anything! Bring her back!" Aeko screamed. "This is just some horrible dream!"

"You're as delusional as Maemi right now," Kadiri said, shaking her head. "I suppose that it's not your fault. The dead body of your friend's right in front of you."

"Hey, I'm not delusional!" I replied.

"You were the one saying 'Nobody's going to commit another murder', right?" Kadiri said. "Well, look how that turned out."

"That's… me being wrong isn't me being delusional!" I replied.

"HEY! Enough with the arguing! Save it for the trial, will ya?" Monokuma stood between me and Kadiri, waving his arms.

"Trial…? We… we have to go again?" Aeko stammered.

"What did you expect? There's a dead body. Why wouldn't he hold a trial?" Kokuro said.

"What gives you any right to speak?" Aeko struggled more against Dai.

"Aeko, please, calm down. At the trial, we will serve justice to the horrible person who did this," Dai said. "So please… for now, help us investigate."

Aeko slowly stopped struggling, and Dai slowly let her go. Aeko dropped to the floor, and began uncontrollably sobbing.

"Now that that's all settled, I've updated the Monokuma File on your phones to be up-to-date with Victim Numero Dos!" Monokuma said.

"I'm guessing we don't have time to get changed…" Kenji said.

"I'll give you guys some time and a set of your clothes after the investigation, but before the trial, to get changed," Monokuma said. "Aren't I generous?"

"If you really were generous, you'd tell us who killed her," Airou said.

"Well, I'm generous, but not _that_ generous," Monokuma replied. "Anyway, get cracking with the investigating, and I'll see you all later!"

With that, Monokuma disappeared, leaving the thirteen of us with Tae's body.

"… We best begin the investigation. We can't just stand around with Tae's body forever," Delawyn said.

"R-Right…" I said. I decided the best thing to do right now would be to check the Monokuma file.

I pulled out my phone and opened the file.

 _The victim was Tae Kawada, the Ultimate Barista._

 _The body was found at 7pm._

 _The body was found in the backstage area of the recreational room on the 2_ _nd_ _floor, hanging from the cords. Signs of blunt force on the victim are present._

 **TRUTH BULLET – MONOKUMA FILE**

"That's… a lot less information than last time," I said.

"It could be because we already had the last crime and know how to investigate now…" Dai said.

"Or he's withholding information that could lead us to the culprit from us," Delawyn suggested. "… I'll investigate the body."

"I'll accompany you," Korin said. "So we're clear you're not the culprit, of course."

"… I'll admit, I have no alibi from 12pm to 6pm, aside from you visiting me around 2pm," Delawyn said.

Satoko stood closer to her brother.

"I take it you're watching me as well?" Delawyn asked, and Satoko nodded silently.

"Alright… I'm going to stay here and investigate here first. Everyone else, uh… group up into groups of three, and investigate elsewhere, okay?" I said.

"Why would we do that?" Airou asked. "Leave you alone in the recreational room, free to destroy evidence?"

I gestured to Delawyn, Korin, and Satoko. "Does it look like I'm alone in here? And besides, me and Hisoka have an airtight alibi from 1pm onwards!"

"An alibi?" Seiryo asked.

"Yeah, Hisoka and I were in here setting up and playing pool together until the party began!" I said.

"Fair enough," Airou said. "Very well. Let's all go investigate, everyone,"

One by one, everyone else filed out of the room, except…

"Maemi, is there any place particularly I should investigate?" Hisoka asked.

"Um… if there's a group of 2 in there, go investigate Tae's lab," I said. "I'll catch up with you later, okay?"

"Okay. See you, Maemi," Hisoka said, before heading out the door.

I… sure had my work cut out for me. But for Tae, for Aeko, and for everyone's sake… I had to solve this murder.

 _ **INVESTIGATION [START!]**_

I headed backstage first, and did my best to ignore Tae's hanging body. It was… easier said than done.

I decided to investigate the surroundings of her body. I took a look around, and found… nothing. Everything seemed to be how it usually was.

 **TRUTH BULLET – UNTOUCHED BACKSTAGE**

I couldn't find anything else of interest regarding the crime scene, so I decided to interrogate Korin and Satoko for the time being on their involvement.

I gently tapped Korin on the shoulder.

"Hey, uh, do you have a moment, Korin?" I asked.

"Do you suspect I did this?" Korin asked.

"Uh- um, it's too early to say that…" I replied.

"I think it's good to be suspicious. Admittedly, my alibi is flimsy," Korin said. "I have been delivering outfits to the other students here since 10am. Satoko occasionally came in with a coffee for me. I think I would be sewing for about half an hour, before going out with a set of clothes and handing them over. I couldn't be gone from my lab for more than ten minutes every time."

"Thirty making, plus ten going, since 10am… That's only about twelve outfits, though," I said.

"I gave Satoko her dress yesterday, and I had noticed you and Hisoka entered the recreational room together and thus decided to make the two back-to-back. These are also only estimates, so bear that in mind," Korin said.

"Okay… and did anything odd happen while you were giving the outfits out?" I asked.

"I went to give Tae her outfit at around 2:30. I knocked on her door, but the door was locked, and Tae wasn't answering. I assumed she had locked herself inside to focus on her food," Korin said.

"I see… Thank you for your help," I said.

"No problem. As for Satoko, she was in her lab all day," Korin said.

"I'll ask her myself, but thank you," I said.

 **TRUTH BULLET – KORIN'S TESTIMONY**

 **TRUTH BULLET – KORIN'S ALIBI**

I decided to talk to Satoko next.

"Hey, Satoko, uh…" I said. Satoko just looked nervous… I figured she wouldn't say anything even now.

"Um… what were you doing at the time of the murder?" I asked.

Instead of a verbal response, Satoko stood up and headed towards the door.

"I- Don't worry, I don't suspect you!" I said.

Satoko paused for a moment, before slowly waving me towards her. I… think she wanted me to follow her.

I did as she asked, and we walked across the hall to her lab.

Inside, there were… a lot of finished sculptures. They certainly weren't here when I was here last time.

"Wow… these are amazing, but aren't we investigating right now?" I asked.

Satoko nodded, looking towards the floor. It… finally clicked for me.

"Oh! If you were in here making sculptures, then you couldn't have done it, right?" I said.

Once again, Satoko nodded.

"Alright, I get it…" I said. "… Did you see anyone come in or go out?"

Satoko shook her head.

"Okay… so only you were in here," I said to myself. "Alright, thank you, Satoko!"

 **TRUTH BULLET – SATOKO'S TESTIMONY**

Satoko gestured for us to return to the recreational room. That was probably a good idea… Delawyn had to be close to finished with an investigation of the body.

We went back across the hall and entered the room… and we noticed that Tae's body had been removed.

"H-Hey, where'd her-" I began, but was cut off.

"I took her down," Delawyn said, and as I approached, I could see her body lying flat on the floor.

"But… isn't her body being tied up important evidence?" I asked.

"I can't see any evidence that could be destroyed by taking her body down," Delawyn said. "Contrary, actually. It… also felt cruel to just leave her hanging there."

"Okay… uh, what have you found?" I asked, slowly approaching the body.

"First, there's no bruising around her neck," Delawyn said. "But I did find a bruise on the back of her head."

Delawyn gently parted Tae's hair, and showed a large purple bruise on the back of her head. "That said, I cannot find any major cracks in her skull."

 **TRUTH BULLET – TAE'S UNBRUISED NECK**

 **TRUTH BULLET – BRUISE ON TAE'S HEAD**

"Secondly, this is probably obvious, but this is not Tae's usual dress," Delawyn said. I nodded in agreement. "I… don't think she put it on herself, though. The placement is too neat."

"I see… So, she didn't put it on." I repeated to myself. "You think she just needed help putting it on?"

"That's possible. It's also possible that the dress was put on her by someone else after her death," Delawyn said.

 **TRUTH BULLET – TAE'S DRESS**

I knelt next to Delawyn.

"Alright, anything el… Okay, did one of you go swimming?" I asked, as I became very aware of the smell of chlorine.

"So, you noticed that too. It's coming from Tae's body. Her hair's wet, too," Delawyn said. "As is the rope."

 **TRUTH BULLET – WET HAIR AND ROPE**

"That's about all I could find relating to the case," Delawyn said.

"That's alright… I think that we've found a lot relating to the case," I said. Delawyn stood up, and I did the same.

"… I think it would be best if I stayed with the Uesaka siblings and guarded the body," Delawyn said.

"Really? What about the whole 'Don't split up' thing?" I asked.

"You said yourself. You have an airtight alibi with Hisoka," Delawyn said. "Mine's not so airtight. I was in my room most of the day. So, it's best I'm under the watch of the siblings."

"Alright… I trust you, Delawyn," I said, before heading out of the room.

There didn't seem to be anything else of note, but the chlorine smell coming from Tae's body concerned me a lot… I decided to head to the balcony overlooking the pool, but first decided to first get a rope so I could climb down and up to the pool if needed. And the only place I could think of that stocked them aside from where we found Tae's body was…

… Ugh, _that_ room.

I swallowed my pride, and pushed my way into the room, trying to ignore what it was used for.

As I walked towards the wall, however, I noticed one of the hooks on the wall had no rope attached to it…

"… Huh?" I mused to myself, tracing the empty hook with my finger. "I… don't think this was always missing…"

"It wasn't," I heard Kadiri's voice behind me, and turned around to see her with Seiryo and Kenji.

"Um, how exactly do you know that…?" I asked.

"Don't ask questions you're not prepared to know the answers to," Kadiri said. "Of course, like you, I have an alibi for the entire day."

"I see… you were practicing your scene with Dai, right?" I asked.

"Yes," Kadiri said. "And as I said, that rope wasn't always missing."

"Okay, so the rope here's gone missing…" I mused to myself.

 **TRUTH BULLET – MISSING ROPE FROM LOVE HOTEL**

"Why are you in here, Maemi?" Seiryo asked.

"I needed a rope myself," I replied.

"Bweh… I didn't think you'd be into kinky things," Kenji said.

"N-No! It's not for that at all! Even if I was into things like that, we're investigating!" I said. "I need the rope so I can easily get from the balcony to the pool."

"Do you think climbing's going to be easy in that dress?" Seiryo asked.

"Well, no…" I said. "But I've got to do it, right? Taking the stairs would take much longer."

"You are cleared thanks to Hisoka, so I suppose there's nothing stopping you from putting your other clothes back on," Kadiri said. "You've got them with you, right?"

"Yeah, I do," I said.

"I'll tell everyone you're in the laundry room getting changed," Kadiri said. "Ease of investigation and all that."

"Alright, thank you, but… er, first, Seiryo, where were you at the time of the murder? I know Kenji couldn't get to the 2nd floor, and Kadiri and Dai were together the whole time," I said.

"Admittedly, my alibi is not strong. I went for a swim at around 3pm. I was in the pool for an hour, before getting out at 4pm. At around the same time, Korin gave me the clothes I wear now," Seiryo said. "I saw nothing related to the murder, just a few puddles."

 **TRUTH BULLET – SEIRYO'S TESTIMONY**

"Okay… thank you," I said, before heading out of the room, a rope slung over my shoulder.

I locked myself in the laundry room and began taking my clothes off, replacing the dress with my normal clothes.

It was a little regretful, but… if I wanted to solve Tae's murder, I was happy to return to things as normal.

I finished putting my clothes back on, unlocked the door, and ventured back out into the hallway.

"You're done?" Kadiri asked me as I left.

"Yeah, and I put the dress in the washing machine, too," I replied.

"Good. I'll go back to Seiryo and Kenji," Kadiri said, before heading down the hallway.

I walked into the room overlooking the pool to find Hisoka, Airou, and Kokuro already there.

"Have any of you found anything?" I asked.

"Actually? Yes, we did," Kokuro said. "Hurry up and take a look here."

I quickly moved to where Kokuro had gestured, and saw…

"Huh? The railing's wet here…" I said.

"Excellent fucking observation," Kokuro said, the sarcasm in her voice thick enough to break a butter knife.

 **TRUTH BULLET – WET PATCH ON BALCONY RAILING**

"Now now, Maemi's only just come in and has been doing some investigating of her own," Airou said.

"Y-Yeah. Um, so there's a wet patch here." I said.

"I also found this," Hisoka said, and held up a metal pole. It was black, and only a few centimetres in diameter.

"You think this could be the-" I began.

"There's no blood, and there's no cause of death on the file. I kind of doubt it's the murder weapon," Kokuro said.

"That said, I still think it's important," Hisoka said.

 **TRUTH BULLET – BLACK METAL POLE**

"Alright… do you mind if I tie a rope here, so I can get to and from the two floors easily?" I asked.

"Be my guest, Maemi," Airou said.

I tied one end of the rope to the railing near the corner so I could scale up the wall, and slid down the rope to the pool area.

The first thing I noticed once I reached the bottom was the wet patch under the railing, trailing out of the pool. It had dried up some, but was still visible.

"Hey, there's a wet patch here, too! Right under the same patch in the railing," I said.

"There's a good chance they're related, then," Hisoka said. "Anything else down there?"

"I'm looking," I said, glancing around the room. Nothing else seemed to be out of place… except one thing.

"Hey, there's a wet trail over here!" I said, heading towards the pool's entrance. I left through the doors, and entered the wrap-around hallway.

I saw the trail of pool water leading into the men's room. However, as my hands wrapped around the door handle…

"Oi!" Monokuma slid into the space between me and the door.

"Eek!" I said, stumbling back.

"I'll let you wander around at nighttime in your underwear, and I'll let you wander into the men's bathroom. But wandering into the men's changing room's where I'm drawing a line!" Monokuma said.

"Seriously? The men's changing room, during an investigation, is off-limits, even though somebody clearly went in there?" I said.

"Yep! If you wanna investigate, why don't you get your little boytoy to help you?" Monokuma said.

"Boytoy?" I asked.

"Yeah, Hisoka! Or just one of the guys in general!" Monokuma replied.

"B- Hisoka is not a boytoy, let alone mine!" I replied.

"Yeah, yeah, sure," Monokuma replied. "Either way, you're gonna have to get a guy to investigate this place!"

"And if I investigate myself?" I asked.

"Didn't you notice? There's a machine gun on the other side of both doors. A scanner scans your student phone, and if you're a girl entering the boy's room or vice versa…" Monokuma said. "Need I say anything else?"

"N-No, I got it…" I said. "Seriously, just for being a different gender?"

"Can't have any peeping toms, can we?" Monokuma said, before vanishing again.

 **TRUTH BULLET – SECURITY SYSTEM IN CHANGE ROOMS**

"Ugh…" I muttered to myself, before heading back to the pool.

"Did you find where the trail led, Maemi?" Hisoka asked.

"Yeah, I did, but I'm gonna need your help," I said. "Can you investigate the men's room? Monokuma says I can't because I'm a girl, and if I tried to go through, the guns on the ceiling would activate and kill me."

"Uh… sure. That's… comforting to know," Hisoka said, before sliding down the rope and heading towards the rooms.

"I'll let you know about it when I'm done, okay? You go back up and investigate elsewhere," Hisoka said.

"Okay, I will. Thank you so much, Hisoka!" I said.

"Yeah, don't mention it," Hisoka said, before heading towards the rooms.

Using the wall, I climbed back up to the second floor, Airou hooking his hands under my arms and pulling me up when I was in reach.

"Uh… thank you?" I said.

"No problem, Maemi," Airou replied.

"Hisoka should be back soon," I said.

"Where'd he go, anyway?" Kokuro asked.

"I had to get him to investigate the men's room… I can't go in there because it's off-limits to girls," I said.

"All alone?" Airou said. "And if he's the culprit?"

"He's not the culprit. I was with him for half the day," I said.

"Fair, fair," Airou said.

"Alright, if Hisoka comes back, tell him I went to Tae's lab to keep investigating," I said.

"Fine," Kokuro said.

"Um… but first, what were you doing all day?" I asked.

"I was in my room with some of the acrobatic tools in there, practicing a routine for a party that didn't end up happening. Korin bugged me at about 1pm to give me this," Kokuro gestured to the clothes she was wearing. "Not a solid alibi, but that's the truth."

"Alright, and you, Airou?" I asked.

"I understand my alibi is also flimsy. I was in my lab all day. A light inside my lab broke during the day. At around 5pm, Korin gave me the clothes you see here, and I took them and the broken light back to my room," Airou said.

"Okay, seems reasonable." I said.

 **TRUTH BULLET – KOKURO'S TESTIMONY**

 **TRUTH BULLET – AIROU'S TESTIMONY**

"Alright, I'm done here, then," I said, before leaving the room.

I ventured across the hall towards Tae's lab, and as I opened the door, I could hear sobbing sounds emanating from the room immediately.

I looked over at one of the booths to see Aeko sitting inside, the sobbing coming from her. Hiroshi sat next to her, gently stroking her back.

Dai was pulling some of the things out of the oven.

"Um… have you guys found anything?" I asked.

"Aeko and Hiroshi haven't done any investigating, but I can't blame them," Dai said. "The food in the oven is burnt slightly, though."

"Burnt? That doesn't sound like Tae…" I said.

"No, it doesn't. I doubt she would burn her food," Dai said.

 **TRUTH BULLET – BURNT FOOD**

"Okay, anything else?" I asked.

"I… admittedly, only just began investigations myself. Aeko required a lot of comfort," Dai said.

"She still does, admittedly…" Hiroshi said.

"I… I'm sorry, I… I know I should be investigating, b-but…" Aeko stammered, wiping her eyes every couple of minutes.

"Aeko… I'm sorry. We'll find the culprit and avenge Tae, I promise," I said. "So… please, just focus on calming down."

"O… Okay," Aeko said, cradling her arms together.

I continued to investigate Tae's lab, before finding something that smelled heavily of chlorine tucked into one of the booths.

"Huh…?" I said, pulling it out and spreading it over the table.

It was… Tae's old dress, apron and all, soaked and smelling of chlorine.

"Her clothes are soaked through… this has gotta be important," I told myself.

 **TRUTH BULLET – TAE'S SOAKED CLOTHES**

I also saw something in Tae's pocket…

"… Her student phone?" I said. I switched on the power switch, and I found it turned on easily, displaying "Tae Kawada" on the screen. Though… I couldn't access the Monokuma File. I figured that was to be expected… She was dead. Why would she need to access her own Monokuma file?

 **TRUTH BULLET – TAE'S STUDENT PHONE**

"I… think that's it for this room," I said, heading towards the door. As I pushed through, I heard the monitors chime on.

"Ding-dong-ding-dong! The investigation period is up! All lunatics, please meet up in the courtyard! You will be given 10 minutes to get changed into your normal clothes prior to this. Anybody who is not there in the next fifteen minutes will be punished by the Mononurses!" Monokuma said, before the monitors flicked back off.

I was already in my clothes, though… I went to the balcony and grabbed the rope. I untied it from the railings, and I put it back in… that room. As quickly as I could.

After that, I quickly made my way to Hisoka's room… and I waited outside, for five minutes. I needed to know what his findings for that room were.

Hisoka left the room.

"Maemi? What- Oh, right, what I found in that room," Hisoka said.

"Y-Yeah, what did you find?" I asked.

"The trail led into the guy's locker room and stopped in front of a locker. Seiryo's, specifically," Hisoka said. "Found a towel and bathing suit in it, and nothing else."

"It was unlocked?" I asked.

"It was locked, but I told Monokuma it was for investigating purposes, and he unlocked all the lockers for me. There were towels and bathing suits in all the guy's lockers, but Seiryo's was the only one that was wet," Hisoka said.

"Okay, I see. Thank you so much for investigating there, Hisoka!" I said.

"No problem!" Hisoka replied.

 **TRUTH BULLET – TRAIL TO LOCKER ROOM**

"Anyway, we should be to the courtyard, right?" I said.

"Probably a good idea," Hisoka said. We quickly both went to the courtyard.

We weren't the last ones there, but Korin, Satoko, Dai, Seiryo, and Airou were already there.

"Rare you arrive before most of the others," Airou commented.

"About as rare as a necessary and kind comment from you, Airou," Korin replied.

"Stop fighting," Seiryo said. "We have less information on the crime this time, so we will need to cooperate better to find the culprit."

"Well said," Dai said.

"Finally, some sense," Hisoka agreed.

I could hear sniffling and two sets of footsteps behind me, as Hiroshi and Aeko entered the courtyard.

"It's okay… it's okay. We'll find her killer, okay?" Hiroshi said.

"When we do find them… I hope they suffer for what they did to Tae." Aeko wiped her eyes, and I saw an anger I'd never seen in them before… and I couldn't help but agree. Who would hurt someone as defenceless and innocent as Tae…?

Delawyn, Kenji, Kadiri, and Kokuro filed in one by one.

"We've gotta do this again? And so soon? Bweh…" Kenji sighed.

"All because one of us couldn't keep their bloodthirst to themselves," Kadiri commented.

"Whatever. Let's just get the trial over with," Kokuro said.

"I hope that my autopsy will be sufficient," Delawyn said.

"I'm sure it will be…" I replied.

"And the gang's all here!" Monokuma said, descending from the ceiling. "As per last time, please gather inside of the gazebo in front of you!"

We all did as Monokuma asked, not a word between us. The vines closed around the elevator again, and the elevator began its descent.

Tae Kawada…

She was sweet, loving, kind, and always willing to support all of us, from making breakfast in the morning to organizing the class party that got us into this mess. It would be impossible for things to ever go back to the way they were.

And her murderer… was standing in this elevator with us all.

Someone in this elevator thought to kill her.

I didn't want anyone else to die…

… but I wanted justice for Tae. For Aeko. For everyone's sake.

And it would all come down to the second Class Trial.


End file.
